The Circle of Ceridwen: Book One of The Circle of Ceridwen Saga Read online

  We sipped at our ale; it was awkward standing in the kitchen yard, drinking ale and listening to the old cook, and Dobbe seemed to sense this. “A poor greeting this, Lady, to be met by a blood-smeared crone! Lady, I was not always such! Nor Eomer... When we were in the service of Merewala, Eomer was steward of the pantry, and I chief amongst seamstresses!” She held out her gnarled hands, as twisted and brown as the galls of a walnut tree. “Little did we know to what depths we might fall...aye, but we lived; through it all, we lived; tho’ many did not, and our son was taken from us...” her voice caught, and she trembled so that Burginde grasped her by the arm to steady her.

  Ælfwyn glanced at me, and then at Dobbe’s lowered head. She spoke kindly. “Tell me, Dobbe, did your Lady Elspeth perish in the Danish siege?”

  Dobbe shook her head. “No, Lady, the good Elspeth died many years before, God grant her peace. She did not live to see this -” she raised her hands to the yard around us. “He married no more, for Elspeth, good woman, had given him three sons, and tho’ one died in a fall from his horse, two lived on robustly. And now Merewala and sons all, are dead!”

  “Were there any daughters?” I asked.

  Dobbe held her knotty hands before her face. “Aye, Lady, one, as gentle as Elspeth herself; but in the siege she was despoiled by the Danes and threw herself from the roof of the hall.”

  We spoke not; tears were in my eyes for the pity of it all, but this time Dobbe went on unbidden.

  “The whole family is dead, and the rest dead also, or else driven into the woods to live as wolves... all of us who resisted at the fall of the burh, even unto women and children, were slain, and those who lived now live as slaves...My son died, protecting the hall of his Lord, and he had neither sword nor spear, being a humble gentle lad and of the Lord’s pantry, and schooled to the service of the table, and not the service of war.” Here her voice broke, and she sobbed. From across the kitchen yard Eomer cast a sorrowful look at her. She wept not long, tho’, and Burginde forced her to sip a bit of ale from her cup.

  “Tell us of she who came before me,” asked Ælfwyn slowly.

  “Aye,” said Dobbe, gulping down tears and ale. “A sweet maid, too tender for this rough charge. She was a maid of Lindisse, but from the East, and came here with little more than her priest and a few others, save much gold. She died not six months after she came; the fever carried her off, but she was wasting as it was, and would have gone off without it, I think.”

  “Tell me of Yrling,” Ælfwyn said suddenly, and Dobbe’s face twisted at the sound of his name.

  “Ah! The Dane! He is Lord here; he slew my rightful Lord, and his men struck down my boy as if he were chaff...”

  Her voice trailed off, and Ælfwyn asked no more.

  We stood silently, gazing into the cold firepit. After a time Dobbe spoke again. “We do such cooking here as we can, and such baking as we find grain for. No one is left to plant wheat and barley, and so this Summer there will be no food save what is already in the ground, or can be gathered. The Danes killed and ate the sheep soon after they came, and the rest were driven off into the forests and are no more, and so we have no milk or cheese. How the shire will live without wool I do not know, and the Dane seems not to care. The few sheep in the burh yard are all that is left from countless herds.”

  Ælfwyn nodded at all this. “Thank you, good woman, for all you have told me,” she said, and we three drained our cups and handed them back to Dobbe.

  “Thank you, good Lady, and may God bless and keep you, all three,” answered Dobbe.

  She came with us as far as the open wicket, and bowed as we left. We walked around the side of the hall without speaking. My thoughts dwelt on the sufferings Dobbe had known, and of the women, now dead, whom she had served: Elspeth and the poor daughter of Elspeth; and then the maid of Lindisse who had come, as Ælfwyn did, to wed Yrling, and had not lived six months. And yet Dobbe, tho’ old, still lived; as she said, she lived through it all.

  I thought to myself, Four Stones is death to its mistresses; and as I thought this I wondered if Ælfwyn thought the same. I glanced at her grave face as we walked, and was again moved by her pride and beauty. She looked at me, and I smiled, and took her hand and squeezed it, and said again in my heart: I am for you, and will never desert you.

  We came to the entrance and walked down the stone steps to the iron-bound door. We pushed it open, and stood blinking in the dark of the hall. No one was there except four serving men - slaves, they looked to be, and one of them badly lamed - who looked up at us from the firepit which they were cleaning. Without a greeting or nod they went on with their work at the huge pit in the centre of the space. We walked through the hall, its walls bare and smoke-stained, the wood ceiling lost in grime, the floor laying under a foot of straw filthy from discarded bones and nameless debris. At the farthest end was a wood partition with a door, and on it was drawn, in charcoal or some other ashy stuff, the outline of a great black bird, its wings spread, its beak gaping open. Ælfwyn raised her hand to it, and said, “The Raven. It is the sign of the Danes.”

  I was glad we still wore our clogs, for the straw seemed to crawl beneath our feet. Burginde’s dark eyes darted here and there as we made our way into the place, and she snorted in disgust.

  “Pigsty!” she hissed out, her hands on her hips. “Such as not seen a broom or a strewing herb for years!”

  She turned and called in her shrillest voice to the slaves by the firepit, and finding they understood our speech, exhorted them to turn their efforts to the raking away of the begrimed straw under our feet. The men were thin, with ragged hair and beards, dressed in the meanest of tatters, barely enough to drape their scrawny limbs. They hesitated, and Burginde strode up and caught one by the ear, and shook him soundly.

  “Well? Well?” she shrieked, tugging mercilessly, “This is your new Lady before you! Will you or will you not clean this Danish filth?”

  The poor fellow, a slight stooped man of five and thirty or so, opened his mouth and grunted a gurgle, horrible to hear. His tongue had been ripped from his throat.

  Ælfwyn turned her face away, and Burginde released his ear. The four men looked at us stupidly, the tongueless one shaking. Burginde propped her hands back on her ample hips and glared at them all.

  I made bold to speak, for I saw our authority hung in the balance. “Go now, do as you are bid, and make this place fit for your new Lady, and for your Lord’s return.”

  Ælfwyn found voice. “Yes, make it so,” she said, waving her hand in dismissal.

  Burginde barked, “Rake this filth away and burn it outside, or lay it for the swine, tho’ I daresay they lie in better straw then do these Danes! Then, clear that whole firepit, everything out -” she glanced at Ælfwyn, who inclined her head in approval, “and bring all new timber and charcoal. When that is done, and see you do not take all day about it, you great louts, then, when that is done, have clean straw brought in and laid down. I daresay you have no herbs to lay in this savage place, eh?”

  Two of the men shook their heads, the other two looked merely stunned.

  “Ach!” Burginde ended. “Well?” and the men shuffled off to begin their task.

  I caught her hand for a moment and said, “Well done!” and we three women laughed together in the midst of that filthy place.

  We climbed the stairs to our chamber, and Ælfwyn went to her purse and drew out a silver piece and handed it to Burginde. “Take this to Dobbe, that she knows that I am pleased with her,” she said.

  “Ach! You will empty your purse before nightfall,” scolded Burginde.

  Ælfwyn answered at once. “A newcomer at any place buys with his coin a token of respect. It is fitting that those that shall serve me ever after should have this first small boon of me. Besides,” she added, “each coin I give now is one less from the dowry chest.”

  Even Burginde could find no fault with this, and left on her errand.

  Chapter th
e Fifteenth: Jarl and Lord

  LATE in the afternoon we went downstairs to check on the progress of the hall. The filthy straw was gone, and we gazed in wonder at the floor, newly revealed. It was made up of small pieces of stone coloured red and black, no larger than a man’s hand, and set in a rippling pattern that made waves across the floor.

  We were pleased, and Ælfwyn looked around the walls and said, “I would have these walls lime-washed that it might be brighter.”

  Burginde laughed at this, and said we should stay our hands at any further changes save for clearing away filth. But I was glad that Ælfwyn thought this way, for it showed her spirit and pride, and I felt she would not end as had the first bride of Yrling.

  We went back up to our chamber, and shortly heard steps on the stair below. Our dinner was come, brought by the young woman Susa from the kitchen yard. We sat down to the meal, welcoming it more for remembering who’s hands had made it. As we ate I said, “It is good, is it not, Ælfwyn, to have a friend here?”

  Ælfwyn smiled at this, and Burginde said, “A friend in high places is always welcome, and what place be higher than the kitchen?”

  Evening came. We heard the men fill the hall below. We had had no word nor message, no sign of when Yrling might come, and Ælfwyn, I knew, did not desire to ask either Sidroc or the smirking Toki. Perhaps he was come now, and even then feasting below. The evening wore on, and we lit more cressets against the dark. The noise and laughter went on below.

  Ælfwyn began to pace the length of the room, and I wondered at the difference of her temperament by day and by night. Finally I begged her to sit with me and play, and I set up the gaming bones and we two played.

  At length we resolved to sleep; it was too late, he would never come now. So we undressed, and unbraided our hair, and did it in a simple plait for sleeping. Burginde trimmed the cressets, tho’ the noise from below was so loud we knew we could not sleep. Still, we got into our beds and bade each other Good-night, and lay in the darkness listening to the roar of the men beneath. It seemed if anything to be growing louder, and not quieting with the hours. I strained my ears, but could not make anything out. Burginde grumbled a complaint in the darkness over the noise and stuffed a pillow over her head. In a few minutes I heard her snore. Ælfwyn lay silently, but I felt surely, with her eyes open.

  The noise was awful to hear because we did not know their speech or songs, and it was all the louder now that we ourselves were quiet. It was a mix of shouts, laughter, clattering plates, snatches of song, and oaths. But more than the racket kept me awake. I seemed to feel a rush of troubling fear from the featherbed on which Ælfwyn lay so quietly.

  I sat up in the dark. “Ælfwyn?” I asked in a hushed voice, and at once she sat up, her eyes so wide that they showed even in the gloom of our unlit chamber.

  At that moment the racket below rose to a furious pitch, and Burginde snorted and muttered. Then came great laughter and stamping sounds, and all three of us were now bolt upright. Heavy boots tramped up the wooden steps leading to our room; three or four men at least. I wrenched my eyes from the door to Ælfwyn’s face. It was perfectly white.

  “No,” she said softly, in almost a whisper, “not now, no.”

  I threw off my coverlet. The men were now outside on the landing. There was no time to try and relight a cresset; I pulled our mantles from the wall pegs, slipped into mine, and threw Ælfwyn’s and Burginde’s to them as they clambered out of their beds. Ælfwyn stood with a stricken look by her bed, clutching the mantle around her, her long pale fingers digging into the soft wool. Now the men were just outside the door, laughing and pounding on the stout wood.

  One of the voices called out, “Lady! Ælfwyn, Ælfsige’s daughter, your Lord is here!” At this there was much laughter, broken off suddenly by a word from one of the men.

  All was silent. Ælfwyn took a step towards me and stopped. I drew a breath and tried to still the racing of my heart as I crossed to the door. I called, “Who is it that comes so late to my Lady Ælfwyn’s chamber?”

  The silence outside the door was unbearable to me. It did not last long. A deep voice broke it, commanding, “Open to Yrling, Jarl and Lord.”

  What little colour that was left in Ælfwyn’s cheeks now fled, but she stood straight and did not waiver. She gave the slightest of nods, and I, with trembling fingers, grasped the iron on the door and pulled it open. Torchlight spilled into the dark chamber, nearly blinding me with its brilliance, and I moved back by Ælfwyn’s side.

  Three men came into the room, and I saw that one was Toki, and one was Sidroc. The third amongst them strode into the heart of the narrow chamber. So did we first set eyes on Yrling, Lord of Four Stones.

  He spoke not, but looked upon us, at the room, and mostly at Ælfwyn. He was perhaps a little above middle height, but not so tall as Sidroc. His chest and arms were of a man far larger, tho’, and from his sleeveless leathern tunic the bare brawn of his arms gleamed as if oiled. From his neck hung a single ornament on a chain, and from that first night I never saw him without it. It was a curious design, like a shortened, blunt spearhead hung upside down. The silver from which it was worked shone brightly, and it was covered all over with spirals, like onto our own jewels.

  What was most striking, tho’, was his bare arms, for he wore this night no linen tunic under his leathern tunic. Coloured designs in red and blue of intertwining serpents were pricked into his arms, the first of such I had ever seen. His hands were large and gloved in short gloves of dark leather, and he wore leathern wrappings about his legs, as if he had returned from battle or the hunt.

  His hair was light brown, and like many of the Danish warriors, worn long, past shoulder length and braided in two braids. His eyes were blue and bright and flashed out from a wide brow, and but for a nose which had been badly broken, he might of been a man of high good looks. He had no large scars upon his face, and was, like most of the Danes, clean-shaven. He was beyond youth; I thought him to be more than thirty years of age, but not much more.

  His eyes had stopped moving around the room and rested solely on Ælfwyn. She met his gaze for a moment, and then her cheeks flushed crimson and she looked at the floor. He continued to stare at her, a look that was nearly a glare. He made no move towards her in welcome, nor did he speak.

  At last she stepped forward, a small step, and without raising her eyes from the floor inclined her head in the smallest of bows.

  “Ha!” he said, as if he had won a small challenge. “I see now you can move, but can you speak?” His speech was so heavy with the flat twang of the Danes that it was hard to understand.

  “Of course I speak,” began the Lady, and I saw that although her head was still down, she was trembling with anger and not fear. “What would you have me say?” she answered more softly.

  He looked at her, and then at me. “Some word of welcome, perhaps, for your Lord? Your hus-band?” and he grinned and stressed this word so that Toki’s voice rang out in laughter. Sidroc smiled as well, but stilled Toki.

  Ælfwyn bowed lower, but spoke to the floor, and tho’ her voice was low, in it was much resentment. “Welcome, Lord. I am Ælfwyn, daughter of Ælfsige, reeve of Cirenceaster of the Kingdom of Wessex.”

  Yrling was not amused this time. “Look at me,” he ordered, and Ælfwyn did. “Now you will be Ælfwyn, wife to Yrling, Jarl and Lord.” His voice was stern, and he took not his bright eyes from her face.

  Ælfwyn’s cheek blanched, and she did not move, but kept her eyes fixed on Yrling. Yet for all her steadiness of gaze, I wondered if she saw him at all, but did not rather look past him, as one sight-blinded by a charm.

  I feared to speak, yet feared the silence more. I could not see Toki well, for it was he who held the torch, but I looked to Sidroc, who still stood in the doorway. He looked back at me, and then spoke in a measured voice.

  “The Lady is tired, uncle, and we have burst upon her and her friends and frightened them, when you only wi
shed to welcome them and thank them for the preparations they have made to greet you.”

  Yrling said something to Sidroc in their own tongue, and Sidroc answered, and when Yrling looked at us he was smiling once again.

  “I will see you tomorrow,” he said flatly, and he turned and walked past Toki and Sidroc. We heard his step on the stair before Toki turned to follow him. Sidroc turned last, and looked at me as I wrapped my arm around Ælfwyn’s waist. I lowered my head, but felt gratitude just the same.

  When all three had gone Burginde went to the door and flung it closed. Ælfwyn stood silently, and then pushed out of my embrace, and sunk down on the edge of the bed. Burginde lit a cresset from the brazier and the little flame danced wildly around the room.

  Ælfwyn sat limply with her hands in her lap. I looked at Burginde, but she was still sputtering in anger. I sat down next to Ælfwyn, and as soon as I tried to speak, she flung herself upon the cushions and pounded them with her fists, weeping tears of rage. She went on until her tears came in little short sobs.

  Burginde stood before us, wringing her hands, and then turned on her heel and went to the larder chest and brought back a cup of ale.

  Ælfwyn looked up for a moment at Burginde’s urging. When she saw the offered cup, she sobbed out, “Drink it yourself, or give it me if it be poison.”

  Burginde shot back, “If it were poison, I would give it to the Dane. But as I would not roast in Hell for the likes of him, we had better fortify ourselves.”

  And she took a sip of the ale, and handed it to me, and I took a sip, too.

  Ælfwyn raised herself from the bed, and wiped her face with her hand. “You are too forward, Nurse, and now you drink from my own cup,” she said, but she took it from my hand when I offered it and drank.

  “Ach!” protested Burginde. “Me forward? When you greet a Danish jarl thus!” And she began to laugh her deep hearty laugh. “When I saw his face when you answered him! Ah! ‘Twas rich!”