BlackShanglan
Silver-Tongued Papist
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2004
- Posts
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Below are the first 15-odd pages of a new story. They're here for evisceration by anyone who cares to read through them. All comments welcomed. There are images of violence and semi-consensual sex, so please do spare yourself if that offends.
Shanglan
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Broken with burning in the Boar’s last winter,
Aelfric of the Aethelings met that axe-blade, Death.
No warrior’s way; he fell in fever,
and went down the whale-road in his wide-prowed ship.
Last son of his line, he left women lamenting;
Aelwyn, daughter, in duty fierce,
Held the hall and sought help most dire.
As ravens rose in ravening clouds
and flocked to the fort to feast on mens’ blood,
her people cried hunger, her enemy harried,
and her war-band broke and betrayed their king.
Driven dire, she took desperate roads –
sought pact for peace, and paid its price.
This is her tale.
Three days had not passed since my father’s death when the storm broke upon us. His warriors fled, his gold still weighting them as they scattered. The Geats, long our enemies, rode from the north; from the east, the Scyldings, eager for land. Between sword and sea we lay helpless, men running from the hall like water. I, Aelwyn, mustered the handful of who remained and prepared to die in the hall’s defense.
In the yard our men strove upon the paling, bracing the spear-fence to hold the foe. The Geats knew how weak we lay; they would break the heart of the land and then lay spoil as they would. In the hall my sisters crouched amongst their spinning, looking to the north with a sick dread. I had taken the way of the warrior queens, learning the sword, the shield, and the spear. But they longed to be women and live in peace. They had looked to marry kings and princes, but fate and my father’s sudden death found them without hall, home, or husband.
Three days ago my father’s body was laid in his funeral barge, sent with song and mourning into the sea, a gift to the gods. Two days past the men who had feasted in his hall, taken his gold and sung his praises began to slip from us. One day past the Geats were worrying the borders; this morning we dug into the ground to make a desperate stand. Before night the earth would be wet with our blood, and my own sword must strike down my sisters or leave them to be taken as spoil of battle, slaves forever. This would come to pass, if no other aid could be found.
I looked out over the fields, away to where the marsh lay like a shadow on the horizon. I went to ride.
He dwelt on the edge of the fen, shunned and shunning. He had love for no man; he fought for no lord or king, yet lived in his sullen silence, and wrought misery on any who troubled his solitude. All about him by marsh’s edge the land lay barren, sunken, and empty. He had an evil name but dwelt untroubled, and this was why: he was reckoned a deadly man, more fierce than the wolf in winter that spares the sheep and strikes the shepherd. They swore no sword could bite him, so fierce was his fury in battle, and men scattered before him like water from a dish. He fought alone, heedless of his hide, like a man who wished to die – or could not.
A score of years before he had ridden with my father, raging wild upon his enemies. Then he left his hall with a shadow upon him and come to dwell here, a wary silence between them. I knew nothing of what had banished him from us. I feared what I might find. Yet his arm had been known from seawall to mountain and never felt defeat. That was all I need know.
I left my horse when the marsh began to give way beneath it and made my way on to the hovel, sinking with every step. His gaze was upon me before I reached the door; I half saw his glittering eye before he stepped from the shadow and barred my path.
“You’ve lost your way.”
His voice was harsh, unused to speech. His black hair hung down as rough as a pelt, and his long, ranging body sloped toward me taut with power. His face was strange and young; though he had ridden with my father’s war-band before I was born, he looked no older than I.
“This is no land to wander,” he said. “Turn back and take another path.”
I answered him levelly, meeting eyes as gray as the winter tide. “My path is right, if you are Harulth.”
His lips twitched back in a sneer or a snarl. Then his hand shot out to grip my wrist as I felt for my dagger. I ground my teeth and met his gaze.
“Who are you to call me by that name?” His voice was rougher now, with a low, feral note.
“I am Aelwyn, daughter of Aelfric, who has suffered you to live upon this land. He has given you this roof and the fields about. I call you to defend his lands and yours.”
He laughed, a short, bitter bark of contempt, and looked about the mire and the half-sunk ruin of the hut.
“He has given to me these riches, that no one could want or seek to take? He has suffered me to live, who feared to meet me in battle though he had a dozen men beside?” He pushed me back from him, so that I struggled to keep my feet. “And now his whelp demands the price of his cowardice? Let her take it.” He bared his teeth and he drew his blade in a rush.
I brought my sword up. His swift-risen anger burned wild in his eyes, so that I dared not turn my back to him. But more – without his blade, we died that night. My sisters and all my people. I must face him here; I would win or die as I had lived, my father’s daughter and a queen deserving.
We met hard in a sudden clash. He sprang from a wary crouch to strike my buckler with a force that left my arm numb and hanging, the shield half-riven. I dug my feet into the shifting ground, striving to force his blade over and away. Then I saw how his wild blow had left his flank all undefended, and I struck at him. He wore no armor; his skin showed naked in the gap of the rags that were all his clothing. So I saw it as clearly as day.
The sword turned from his flesh. I gave him a blow that must have been the death of him, a low swift thrust that shot beneath his arm and made straight to nestle below his ribs. But my blade glanced from his flesh as if it had been steel. I stood an instant gaping; he swung the hilt of his sword and caught me a heavy blow under the chin that threw me down and rattled the teeth in my head. Then he was on me with a feral leap, pinning me to the oozing ground that began to close about me. He brought his face down close to mine and spoke as his sword’s edge dug against my neck.
“And now, Aelfric’s whelp, tell me why I should spare you. Think well on your words, for I have no mind to see you rise again.”
His grip was like iron, and the wet earth closed about my neck as he leaned his weight into me. I choked out a word as he pressed me down to my death.
“Honor.”
He laughed again, that harsh bark more bitter than his curses – but answered, and stayed his hand as he did.
“What honor do I have, hunted like a dog from hovel to hovel, scouring the border of the marsh, despised of your king and his band of mighty drinkers? What honor is given to me, that I should spare you for it?”
“Not the honor you have,” I said, forcing the words past the ache of my bruised throat. “The honor you will take.” His eyes narrowed. I spoke on, struggling with the weight of him still on my chest. “You judge them right. They fled when the ale grew scant and the enemy near. Hardly a fourth part of them remain – the old, the young, and the feeble. None but you can save them; none but yours, the honor.”
“None but mine the risk and venture.” His lip curled. “And what will I have of it when I am done? This marsh and this hovel. I know your ways, king’s spawn,” he said, and a ragged bitterness came into his voice. His eyes were gray and wild like winter. “You speak fine words now, but in the heat of battle I will stand alone, taking the blows and the hard spear’s strike. And when the blood lies cooling about me, and I half dead with the crush of the fight, then I will find myself outcast once more. No!” he cried. “You will make no fool of me!” His grip tightened on my throat, and he dug the edge of his blade into my skin.
“I will not,” I gasped. “I swear it. What harm has been done you was not done by me. You will stand first among men at my hall, drink first from the horn in peace and take first of the spoils in war. No man will walk before you save the king himself, and no man’s word hold more weight, save he who sits upon the throne. You will be first in all things, and honored best amongst my people – if you will save them. I will swear this by any oath you name.”
He thought long upon this, his blade still digging painfully into my skin. At last he spoke.
“What king is this will walk before me?” His voice was a low growl, his eyes narrowed. I swallowed, feeling the sword’s edge draw blood from my throat. I prayed that I did right for my people. I prayed that I did not deliver them to a fate worse than the Geats.
“What king I will take. Aelfric leaves no son. I am the oldest of his line.”
He flung aside the sword and grabbed my chin, forcing my head back. He crouched to my throat and breathed in deeply, then darted his tongue to lick where his blade had dug into my flesh. I shuddered, but he took no heed – only threw back his head, closed his eyes, and made a low moan to himself.
“Blood of the king. It is true.”
He turned back to me, sudden and wild. He gripped my throat, and his eyes met mine hot and savage.
“Daughter of Aelfric. Do you know what your kin have been to me?”
I shook my head, helpless to speak. He leaned close until his breath brushed my ear as he snarled his words.
“Rats in winter. Plague in a year of famine. The fire that sweeps in the wake of plunder. All things evil, your line has been to me.”
I struggled for my voice, his grip crushing down upon my throat until I could only croak in strangled gasps.
“What my kin have done, let me put right. I will pay the blood price. Name your injuries; I will pay them.”
He gave a howl of rage, and in a sudden fury lashed at the earth by my head. His bare hand clawed a furrow like a plow blade’s, and he snarled in his hatred.
“What price will you pay, miserable get of a lying cur? What price my vengeance?”
He shuddered with the bitterness that welled in him, and I saw then why he was feared, shunned, scarce spoken of above a whisper. The wrath that shook his frame was a scream against the lash that scarred him; he would wreak his pain upon anything that crossed him. What had burned this torment into his heart, I could not guess; what part my kin had played in it, I dreaded to know, so wild were his hatred and despair. For I had learned this from my father: blood can only be paid with blood. Gold may be laid on the counting board, the wergeld set and granted in full – yet hearts that loved with truth and passion cannot be paid in gold. Whatever hurt my kin had done him, Harulth would be paid in blood – and there was none but mine to pay it.
But there would be blood for the Geats if I brought no one to defend our hall. I do not call my choice courage; I faced death every way I looked. But if my death alone would spare my people and leave my sisters safe – then my death alone would be given. I spoke as levelly as I could, meeting the wild vengeance of his gaze.
“I will give anything mine, gold as you will, or blood itself. Save our folk this night, and whatever you name will be yours.”
His hands gripped hard on my body so that I felt them to the bone. He crouched closer, lips drawing back over his teeth, and I thought he would slay me there, torn to the throat. Then his eyes lighted, and he drew back a handsbreadth. His gray gaze grew wise and cruel. At last he spoke, low, rough, and with fierce intent.
“I would be king. King before all men. King as was Aelfric. You will take me before them all and give me honor.”
“I will do it.” I would pay this price if it spared my folk, though I shuddered under his hand. Better that one should suffer than many. Better that I should bear the force of his vengeance then my people meet the swords of the Geats.
“You will be my queen. Under my hand.” He crouched close on my chest, like a beast at its kill. “What your father cast forth from his hall, you will take to your throne and your bed.” His words were a low hiss, the rage lashing just beneath. I nodded. I would do even this – for my people. His eyes lighted with triumph, and I turned my face away. All my life I had known that I would be sold to bind some alliance, and go to the bed of a stranger. This was no worse. I could not dream of more.
He lowered his head to my throat, licking the blood his sword had drawn. His teeth closed on the skin as he growled, his hands already moving upon my body with fierce intent.
“I will have a pledge of you, king’s get. I will have proof that you give me no lies.” His hands closed on my dress. He dragged at the neck of it while he glared down, daring me to refuse.
I closed my eyes and nodded, trying to still my body’s protest. With a fierce cry of victory he tore at the cloth, baring my breasts in a brutal rush that forced a moan from me though I fought it. He took no heed but dropped his head to bite and paw at my body, cruel in his grip upon it. His teeth closed on my flesh and he moaned to himself in low, coarse, animal groans, his hands still digging at my gown. He tore it half down the skirts, taking a vicious pleasure in the rending as he savaged my breasts until I could not but groan with pain. He snarled and gripped my throat again, his grasp closing until I scarce could draw breath.
“Puling get of a weak king! Do not cry to me for mercy.”
I bit down on my tongue, choking back the cries from his brutal onslaught. He dug his hand into my hair and dragged my head back, and with the other yanked open my torn skirts and laid my body bare. He sneered at the shudder I could not suppress, then spat where my thighs joined and the hair grew close and darker gold. Shame welled hot within me; he spat again, then pushed a rough finger against my body. As he forced it into me, I dug my nails into the earth to keep from crying out. His eyes narrowed and he drove deeper, relishing my suffering and shame. Twisting his touch cruelly within me, he lowered his head to my thighs and then pulled roughly out, closing his eyes and breathing in the scent from his hands and my body. A shudder ran through him. When he opened his eyes they burned with a wild, heedless light.
“You are what a queen should be, going to her wedding bed. I will take your pledge, Aelfric’s whore.”
He crushed down upon me, pinning my limbs as he freed his naked length. I closed my eyes and clenched my fists, but could not help a wracking shudder as he forced my body open. I had not known man before, and this was no gentle one, but a savage creature who thrust into me and plundered as he would. He dug his hands into my thighs and forced them wide as he sheathed himself, rending my maidenhead in a hard, hungry rush. He drove deep and left me trembling as he bit at my breasts fiercely enough to leave bruises and broken skin beneath his teeth. He built fast to a frenzy, rutting hard and frantic until he threw his head back with a long jagged cry of release. I felt it through me, the hot pulse of his victory, and I turned my head in shame, sick to my heart with the feel of him. When he had done he threw himself aside, pulling roughly from me to lay panting. At length he rose as I pulled together the tatters of my skirts and struggled up from the reeking mire that was become the bed of my womanhood.
He gave me a swift, sneering glance, his eyes filled with a bitter contempt. But when he turned he went into the hut, and when he came forth he was armored and carried a sword and shield. He looked at me, his gaze wild and driven still.
“Tonight your hall will lie in safety. Look to it you welcome me as befits a king to be wedded.”
I shuddered, not turning as I picked my way over the marsh to my horse.
When I came to the yard I rode hard to the horse-shed, clutching my torn dress to hide my shame. The warriors left to us milled about in confusion, but I stalked through them to the hall as swiftly as I could. I saw how their eyes lingered on me, the great rents in my robes and the mire that clung to my skin and hair. I hastened to the women’s quarters and shot the bar of my sisters’ chambers, the only refuge I could find. They huddled there, staring, until I caught my shadow in the polished steel mirror and saw how I must look – a shambling figure in ragged clothing and the reek of the swamp, the sword still at my belt and a wild light in my eyes. I flushed and turned to speak to them.
“I have found a champion who will put the foe to flight. But I have of your skills, that I know little of.” They stared, and I felt the blood rise hot to my cheeks. “I wed tonight. Join with me to do him honor.”
They came to me then, my sisters – Aelethe, Freyna, and Janna, with her soft brown eyes and her kind face. She was the youngest, and the dearest to my heart, for she always knew my moods. Now she kissed my cheek and touched me with a gentle hand, and I saw that she knew, no less than the others, what price had bought the safety of the house. Aelethe and Freyna were near sunken with horror, but Janna gave me a tenderness – her love for me, and her love of the sacrifice I would make for her. Aelethe and Freyna, when they had their wits about them, ran to fetch clothing, gold rings and rich jewels, and set the serving women scurrying for wood and water that they might bathe me. But Janna brought wine warmed with spices and sat by my hand stroking my hair and gently combing the tangled mire from it.
“Whence comes this warrior, whose arm will save us? Tell us how we may honor him, who takes our dear sister to wife.” Her voice was low and she was quiet in her ways – in no wise a warrior, but there was strength in her gentle touch. In this she won honor: that she spoke gently, and served softly, and loved well, when it took more courage than a man would need in battle. She knew what my ruin meant, but she had faith in her love; she would bring this man, by strength of her goodness, to kindness to her sister. She could not know what she faced; nothing would turn that bitter grey tide, that fierce, wild vengeance. But she would strive, though warriors grown would cower away from him. She would meet him in a battle of her own.
“He lies close by the marsh,” I told her, and shut my lips. Her eyes widened; she saw my meaning. But I would not make it inarguable, not while Aelethe and Freyna worked busily and missed our words. Soon enough they would see the truth; for now they might be spared this final blow.
Janna nodded. Her hand closed softly over mine, and I saw how her tears welled for me, until I must look away or weep myself. I would not yield; no warrior sobs for his wounds from battle, and I would not weep for this.
“He will be a strong king to us,” she said. “He has as fine a queen as ever we have known.”
I gripped her hand, staring ahead. I would not let tears fall.
They groaned when I drew my garment from me and they saw the track of his grip upon my body. Even Aelethe, who was always cool and close with herself, took my neck gently with her hand and pressed her brow to mine, mute with grief before the bruises that darkened my skin and the blood and mire smeared upon my thighs. Freyna drove the serving women from the room, and then they took my hands, my sisters, and helped me themselves to the water drawn to bathe me. They were gentle, the pride and slights of our youth cast aside as they eased me to the water that stung where his teeth had torn. They brought soap and sweet herbs to cleanse my body and worked upon my hair to wash the mud and the smell of the marsh from it. Janna brought wine again, warm to the stomach, and herself washed gently from me the stain of blood upon my thighs – the mark of what he had taken. She cradled my head to her breast as I grew loose and weary with the wine, and held me there softly as Aelethe and Freyna scrubbed at my skin with stiff brushes of boars’ hair, cleaning my hands and my feet.
At last I rose from the water. I sat by the fire, Janna combing my hair and fanning it to dry as Aelethe and Freyna dressed me. They brought the finest we had: rich cloth brightly dyed and wrought with fine stitching, heavy arm-bands and rings of twisted gold. I scarce could meet their eyes as they put the riches upon me; who knew what ruin he would make of the fine bright things? I forced my mind from it, and from the thought of how he would take his way with my body beneath the finery. If our people lay safe – if the wretched serfs and drudges who even now streamed into the hall pleading for safety, were given it – he might do what he will. Yet the fear was cold within me. What if he cheated his bargain? What if he took everything before him? What battle could we give him? What resistance could we make? I dug my nails into my palms and set my face, straightening under the heavy the gold. I would show no fear. I had done all I could. I would die in the struggle to save the hall, and none could ask more of me than that.
When my sisters’ work was complete, we sat a space in silence. They would not ask what they dreaded; I would not say it. Then long and low came a moan from the hall – a hound groaning its fear and loathing. The cries of the horses rang out from the yard, and I rose, knowing what drove them. I passed through the broad doors of the women’s chambers and into the hall itself.
The dogs’ howls rose to a clamor. They stood with their ruffs stiff about their necks, their ears laid back and lips drawn in nervous snarls. They backed to the shadows, half-sick with fear and hatred of what came, and the men looked up with pale faces as they sought their weapons. They thought that the Geats had come swift across the plain – but I knew what trod the stones of the stableyard, and I would meet it as befit a queen and a warrior. I passed through the benches with a swift step and flung wide the great iron-bound doors of the hall.
He stood there in the yard, the poor mute peasants who thronged the gates shrinking away on every side. The horses, tied fast to the rail, danced frantically and shuddered away from him, their eyes rolling white. He wore the armor he had donned at his hut, a heavy plate of strange design and gauntlets whose steel banding bore etchings that writhed in the light of the sinking sun. His sword he bore naked in his hand, and along its blade a grey light flickered and ran like water. His shield was blank, covered in a black hide with no device or allegiance, and his mantel was made of the skins of wild beasts, half-tanned and tangling with the black pelt of his hair. Over his brow gleamed the dull steel of a helmet, wrought to fantastic likeness of the head of a snarling wolf. Beneath it shone his bitter eyes, gray as the tide and more remorseless. He swept the hall with the glance of a wolf crouched upon a lamb. Then his eyes lighted upon me and he spoke.
“What welcome do you make me, Aelwyn daughter of Aelfric, king of the Aethelings? What welcome does Harulth find in the hall of the warm and well-fed people?”
I fought down the anger that rose at his taunt, for I saw in his bearing how he longed for havoc. There was a well of hatred in him, venom brimming in his brooding gaze. He sought any slight that would bring the blade from his side and set him loose upon my people. I would master myself, and see that he was not given it.
“Welcome, Harulth, first in battle, first in counsel, first to walk within the hall.” I kept my voice low and even, walking toward him with my hands open. “Welcome king. Welcome husband.”
A gasp and murmur ran through the people, a low groan of fear in the handful of warriors left to stand at my back. Harulth’s eyes lighted triumphantly, and he drew himself taller, prouder than the skulking slouch he’d worn to the door. As he stalked into the hall he glared at man and beast until the warriors dropped their eyes to the floor and the fiercest of the hounds slunk to the shadows, showing its teeth but pressing its tail between its legs. He took my hand, raising it to show his conquest, and spoke with fierce defiance.
“We are wed. By the word of the queen. By the word of he who is now her king. Let any man speak who wills it otherwise.”
He glanced about the hall, still in that hot, eager thirst for slaughter that sent the women trembling to the corners and the men shameful to the benches. He bared his teeth in a mirthless grin and took up a horn of ale.
“Drink! Drink to your champion. Drink to your king.”
He watched the men with an evil eye, and they took up the horns and roused a weak cheer, though one or two sought my gaze in anguish. I held myself strong, although his hand crushed mine within it. The truth of the bargain would be seen this night. Already the yard thronged with those who fled the enemy; they could not be far from the gates. Harulth gulped the ale and dragged his gauntlet over his lips. He looked upon me for a long moment, the fierce joy of vengeance still in his eye, then turned to face the hall, his voice fierce and intent.
“Let no man stir from the hall this night. Let the rabble without look well to themselves, and keep within the paling. Whatever you care for, man, beast, or burden, keep it within the gates of the yard or give it up for lost. Whatever you hear, however bold you think yourselves –“ and here he sneered at the warriors who would not meet his gaze – “do not venture out, or you mark yourself my enemy. The Geats will find no mercy this night; nor will you, if you set foot beyond the gate.”
The men turned half-sullen at this speech, muttering amongst themselves. The oldest of them, those who had ridden with my father in his youth, turned pale and made signs to ward off evil. The younger men glared and looked to each other for strength, but none had the courage to challenge him. Harulth stared them down man by man, taking a pleasure in the way their eyes dropped as he turned to each. He made a slow sweep of the hall and lighted at last on me. I fought to keep my chin raised and my face open. I met his gaze, and would not look away.
“You,” he hissed, his expression darkening. He grabbed my neck, half-staggering me as he forced my head down. I could not resist his arm – but I looked up at him still, eye to eye, and he snarled and shoved me back. I heard a gasp and felt a touch on my arm, and sensed more than saw that Janna caught me, with Aelethe and Freyna close behind, stepping up to attend their queen with a courage that thrilled my heart. I closed my hand upon Janna’s as I saw his eyes flick down to her, the unthinking rage blooming in them. Then he raised them to me again, wild and bitter, and spat out his words.
“You will be sent for. My mark is upon you, and you will know my call. Leave your fine rings and your gold behind; come naked to the gates when you are called for. Heed this, for if I do not know you, you are but a dead woman.” His eyes narrowed, and his lip curled as he raked me with a contemptuous glance. “You will slake my thirst, or your people will suffer for it.”
A moan ran through the women of the hall, and the men looked ashamed of their fear and silence. But I met his eyes, determined I should show myself no coward. Janna’s hand closed tight upon mine and I thought of her standing there behind me, her soft brown eyes willing honor in this creature in a battle as fierce as any meeting of blades. I struggled to think how Janna would show her courage in my place, and the answer came to me in the instant.
“I will come to your call.” I slid from my shoulder the largest of the arm-rings, a torc of twisted gold won by my father in the lands of the Scyldings many winters past. I raised it to him as I stooped to one knee, bowing my head and fighting to bring my voice level. “May fate preserve my husband, and bring him safe to his hall. May this token guard his life and guide his arm in strength of battle.”
His eyes blazed with fury, and he snatched the ring from my hands. He moved as if to strike me, a murderous anger deep in his gaze as he searched my face for a sign of mockery. Janna’s strength rose up within me; I met his eyes unflinching and put into all my being the will that he should return in truth, safe from the crush of battle. I willed it so strongly that my heart began to open to it, and he stumbled in confusion, dropping the hand he had raised to strike me. With a snarl, he stalked from the hall – but the torc gleamed red upon his arm in the light of the setting sun.
We held the gates open as long as we could, sending men running to hasten the peasants who fled the coming of the Geats. As the sun sank lower Harulth raged amongst them and drove them running from their carts and bundles to seek the shelter of the yard. The men who ranged the paling looked to me in anger, as if I should curb the vicious haste with which he scattered them before him. But I could not fault him. Over the hills the ravens were massing in clouds of eager omen, and soon – too soon – in the falling dusk the lights stood out upon the slope, and came on with a rush and a rumor. Then a great wail went up from those still outside the gates and they surged forward, crushing men before them as they fled in terror. Harulth stood his ground, raging and striking at them with the flat of his blade, beating them from him and cursing them for fools. But I saw this: his hand reached down to the ground. He stooped as the flood broke about him, and when he raised himself up, half-swept from his feet in the rush of their flight, he brought a child with him. He flung it into a cart, savage in his gesture and fierce in his hunger for battle – but the child landed safe.
As the last of the throng fled into the yard, Harulth came hot at their heels, driving them before him. He looked up to the gatesmen, the thunder of the Geats’ coming now heavy on the hill, and cried out in a wild, ragged howl.
“Bar the gates! Damn any man still without, and damn the man who opens ‘ere I tell him!”
The crowd within surged forward with the gatesmen and pushed the gates to, dragging home the great oaken bar. Harulth watched them close as they did. Then, as the bar shot home, he turned and flew up the hill, roaring his challenge to the Geats as he plunged into the milling dusk. The darkness fell ‘round him as he ran to meet the thunder of their hooves, but soon enough we knew what he wrought there.
The screaming of their horses came to us first, high shrieks of terror that struck ice into our hearts. Then the cries of men rose up – not the deep, rolling chants of battle, but screams of mortal fear and anguish. Mothers crushed their children to them, covering their ears and sobbing against them for very horror as the shrieks rent the air. Their voices rose up from the battlefield, sobbing in pain and terror, crying out to their comrades in desperate need, begging for mercy in helpless pleas soon torn short. Under it all rose a terrible cry, a snarling frenzy like the voice of hungry death itself loose amongst the Geats. They had come to plunder, to lay low all that sheltered us – and yet we pitied them, in that darkness.
How long they suffered, no man of us can tell. I know only that at length, the men of the Geats lay silent – and yet the dread clangor rang out still, the awful track of a beast run wild in its rage. The women screamed and the warriors trembled at their arms; still, no man dared mount the paling to see what stalked below. As it crashed through the lines of abandoned goods, a boar started up with a long squealing scream; it was cut off close to the gates, and in the rattle of its death-cry a great blow struck the gate itself, struck and fell with a slithering thump. The people moaned with one voice, a wail of helpless terror, and the horses tore frantically at their rail, dragging it nearly from its posts. The foam stood out on their flanks, and in the light of the rising moon their eyes rolled white and wild.
Then a howl broke out, a long ragged cry that sank freezing into the heart. It was a cry of anguish, of hatred and vengeance, of a bitter rage so deep and despairing that I knew in the instant who spoke from the field of battle. I knew who called, and hastened to the gate.
The stones were cold beneath my feet as I threw off my shoes and flung the gold swiftly from my arms. There was no time to think upon the eyes that watched me. What I went to, I feared with such numb sickness at heart that I thought nothing of the eyes of men. I pulled the rings from my fingers, dropping them to the stones, and fumbled at the catches of the dress as he howled again, long, jagged, louder now and closer. Aelethe and Freyna came to me, taking the garments as I flung them off, and half-spoke as if to plead. I shook my head, dropping the last work of mens’ hands from my body, and met Janna’s eyes as they filled with tears and she nodded her head. I did not know what he might do to my body, whether to plunder or to destroy. But the Geats lay dead all along the hill, of this I had no doubt – and between my people and the fury of what had laid them there, there was only me.
“Aelwyn! Send her!” The voice from without was ragged and wild, the cry of a man driven to utter desperation. I ran to the small door by the gate, the guard half-wishing to fight me – not, I saw in his white-circled eyes, to save me, but that he would not open the gate to what he knew lay without. I pushed past him and slipped through it, shutting it behind me and hearing the bolt slam home. Then I looked out upon the field of battle.
No living thing met my eye. By the gates lay the carcass of the boar whose death had carried to our ears, the ground around it soaked in a pool of blood. A great red burst upon the gate showed where it had struck, near a man’s height above the ground. All about the paling, where I could see in the torchlight, lay the bodies of men, horses, sheep, swine – whatever had lain outside the gates. Some were cleaved by the sword – I saw a warrior of the Geats with his leg cut clean from him, though the blow had been struck in the broadest part. But I saw as well men whose throats were torn open, their faces fixed still in terror, and the bodies of horses ripped through the belly, their guts strewn in a frenzy. I shuddered, the rank smell of the blood rising up to me. I had seen battle before, and what followed it – but this was carnage.
He was there, crouched in the ruins of the battle, awash with blood to his very hair and panting with the fury that drove him. He made a low moan in his throat as he raised his gaze to mine, and as our eyes met he stood rigid, locked in some fierce struggle within.
I took a step toward him, a step that cost me all the courage I had. He cried out, a howl of pain and frustration, and fell to his knees, smiting upon the ground until he tore it into furrows. He turned his head from me and shuddered through his body, his chest heaving and his fists clenched in the battle that tore him. I watched, sunk in the horror of it. Then at last he turned, a baleful light blazing from his grey eyes, and made for me.
He was over the field and upon me before I could offer any defense. He flung me against the wall, his hands digging into my body, and his eyes met mine wild, furious, and nothing human. I closed my eyes and gave my spirit up to the gods.
“Aelwyn.” His voice was a growl, his eyes lighting with hot intent. He stared at me as he held me there, shuddering through his body as if his very frame was torn from within. Panting with effort, he narrowed his eyes as if to force them to see me, and he snarled my name again.
“Aelwyn!” He lunged forward, gripping my hair as he sunk his mouth to my throat and bit fiercely at the skin. He moaned and growled to himself as his teeth dug into my flesh, his body pressing hard against mine as he rent his armor frantically from him. I closed my eyes and laid my head back, opening my throat to him. He growled in fierce response and crushed his body to mine, pinning me against the rough posts of the spear-wall. He savaged my breasts, seizing the flesh fiercely as I fought not to struggle. I dared not thwart him, with the proof of his power laid all about me. I could not unleash upon my people the force that had strewn the Geats upon the hillside. I laid my body open to him and he took it with a fierce and violent hunger, little more than a beast in his raging fury with the blood of the battle soaking his skin. Yet in the worst rush of it, as his breath panted hot upon my neck, I heard beneath his savage growl a sobbing note of desperation.
In an instant it was gone, torn away like a leaf in a storm. Crushing me to the palings, he lifted me from my feet with an ease that terrified me. He bared his shaft in a swift hard motion and ground against my body, snarling and biting at my breasts as he lifted me over his jutting length. In a moment he had buried himself in me, pinning me to the rough wood of the fence as he drove into my body. Vital, savage, and intent, he thrust hard and frantically. I clung to him for balance as he took my breast in his teeth, closed them sharp upon it and shook his head with a fierce growl. I could no longer hold back a cry of pain; at that he sank his teeth harder and snarled, a rising cry of hunger and pleasure as he savaged my flesh. He wrenched another gasping sob of pain from me, then threw back his head with a taut, fierce joy and rutted hungrily into me. At last he thrust home, forcing my body down hard upon his shaft, and gave a ragged shout of triumph and release. His hands gripped me with bruising strength as he shuddered against my body, and I moaned as he burst within me.
He threw me aside, panting, and staggered against the paling to cling there. For an instant his eyes met mine. He groaned, and in that moment I saw his anguish, pain joined to loathing – loathing of me, that I saw him thus, but beneath it a bone-deep loathing of himself that bit deeper than any hatred for his fellow man. I looked at him in horror and, in truth, in pity, as he won free a moment from the haze of blood and fury. His voice was low, broken, and gasping.
“The thirst. Like fire!”
He struggled a moment in torment. But the hunger grew and burned in his eyes, and that terrible bitterness shone out again and turned on the world around him. He fell upon me, took my hair in his grip and dragged me to kneeling. He threw me forward upon my hands and thrust his fingers into my body, hard and rough, with a crooning groan of pleasure as I shuddered under his touch. He drew his fingers from me and licked them, then dropped to his knees. I trembled, feeling him move behind me as he stooped lower. He drew in his breath, scenting me as if he were in truth a beast. Then he moaned, and his tongue licked out and touched my body, lapping the slickness he had left upon my flesh. He growled by my ear as he reared up behind me, leaning forward over my body.
“My mark is upon you. Bitch. Bitch for my breeding.”
His words were a hot lash of contempt as he fell upon me. Yet he moaned as he pressed his hard shaft against my skin, and he clung a moment over my body, his naked chest pressed to my back. Then he gripped my thighs, digging in his nails as he forced them wide and entered me with a groan.
“Slut of Aelfric, how do you like your bargain?” He snarled in my ear as he plunged into me, brutal in the hard thrust and jerk of his loins. I closed my eyes and clung to the rough ground, trying to think of Janna. He dragged my head back by the hair, arching my body to force himself deeper, and growled as he took me savagely.
“Whore who sells her body for a mead hall. Do you like your bargain? Do you like your husband?” He bent close over my body, riding it harder until I scarce could keep to my hands and knees. “I will have you thus every night,” he hissed. “I will take you every evening, daughter of kings, in the very mead hall where your father cast me out. I will have his spirit rise and see how his daughter is grown my whore and bitch.”
He groaned, gripping my hips and driving into me harder still, making my body ache with the fierce thrust of his shaft. He dragged my head back, forcing my body taut to his, and rutted wildly until at last he growled and spat his seed into my body.
I cannot say how often he spent himself upon me that night. It blurred together in an aching, brutal durance. He came on me like a demon, driven from the fury of the battle to rut in a frenzy. By the time he dragged me, stumbling, into the hall, the blood of the battlefield was upon my skin, smearing my body where he’d cast me to the earth. He threw me down on the high table and licked the blood from my breasts and thighs, shuddering through his limbs and groaning to himself while the men huddled outside. One youth indeed, more brave or more foolish, fought to enter, but the others held him back and turned their faces as Harulth threw me over the table at the head, where my father’s great chair stood. He took me brutally on the board where my father’s meat and drink had lain, and howled his vengeance as he loosed his seed upon my loins. That I know clearly; the rest is a haze, like the thick of battle when the battle is won, a heap of shattered images from which no man may see aright.
I woke to pain. My body ached where he had ravaged it, so cruelly that I could scarcely rise. I lay the space of a breath or more and looked about, half-unconscious of where I lay or how I came there. I was in my father’s chamber. I lay on the bed, thrown naked on its covers. Below, in a spent heap by the fire, Harulth lay sprawled on the skins that strewed the floor.
I forced myself to rise, though my body protested. I could see with a glance the deep bruises and bites upon my skin, the long furrows where he had scratched and torn me, the blood that still streaked my flesh, some my own and some from the field of battle. There was pain deeper within as well; it sickened me to think what had lain upon me that night. I stumbled to the fire and drew water from the pot that hung by the coals. I threw herbs and wine into it to steep, then looked back at Harulth.
His body was smeared with the blood and mire of the battle, his ragged hair caked in it. He lay naked, only his upper arm bearing the ring of twisted gold that I had given him the night before. And now I saw what I had not seen in the torchlight last this night past – great bruises that bloomed over his body. They were deep-driven wounds, welling up black and purple with the blood beneath, some two handsbreaths wide and more. They were like nothing I had ever seen, some with the white mark of a sword’s blade or a spear’s point still clear upon them. Where the bruises faded, welts and weals covered his flesh, so that he was a thing hard to look upon. No man could take such wounds and live, though the bite of the blade was turned indeed. His body was battered near to death, and to a pain worse than mine if I judged it right.
His sword was there by him. Shame spoke to me; I knew what might be done as he lay in slumber, his body loosened from its taut fury. Even now he was but half in life, and half beyond it. To come on him at once, with many men, was to kill him.
I crossed the chamber and opened the doors. Then I bid the guards who waited there to bar the door, and let no man pass. Their eyes, shamed, lingered down my welts and bruises, and half questioned me. But I left them and went to my sisters’ quarters, and met Janna running to kiss me as I came through the door. I fell into a chair, and my sisters came to my aid. They brewed a healing draught, and rich broth, nourishing as befitted the wounded. They gave me drink, and cleansed the rents and wounds of my body. All the while they watched me, their eyes sick as they marked the hurt he’d done me. But they gave me no argument, and Janna’s eyes met mine with a pity true and intense as she brought soft robes and draped them about my body.
When I had eaten and drunk and felt my strength returning, I took up the broth and the healing draught and went to him, barring the door of the chamber behind me. I held the wooden bowl by his head, letting the scent of the broth drift to him as he lay deep in sleep. Gradually his slumber lightened, his nostrils fanned wide, and he woke in a swift, fierce rush.
He grabbed my wrist, slopping broth from the bowl as he lunged upright and looked about him as if to defend himself. He glared about the room, fierce for battle; then, finding no foe, he fixed his gaze on me. I held up, as well I could, the bowl of broth. He scowled and took it with ill grace, then held it to his nose and breathed its scent long and warily. At last he gulped it from the bowl, drinking hungrily until he threw the empty vessel aside. He looked up, his gaze touching the wounds upon my body. His eyes met mine and then slid away.
“Why are you here, spawn of Aelfric?” he growled. “What need do you have of me this morning?”
I thought of Janna, and offered him the horn with the healing draught.
“I come to see you tended, lord, and your wounds healed.”
He snatched the horn and smelled it warily, his eyes close upon me. “What witchery is brewed in this? Would you spare your cowards the task of butchering me in my sleep?” He sneered and made as if to fling it from him. I stopped his hand.
“Give it to me. I will drink it.” I met his eyes and saw them sink a moment, looking over my body. I had need of healing, near as much as he did, and my injuries shamed that part of him that still knew shame. He let go the horn, and I drank from it before handing it to him. His gaze met mine for a long moment; then he drank, draining the horn and casting it away.
“Why bring me this? What game are you playing, daughter of the weak arm and the coward’s heart?”
My blood rose, but I would not let him bait me so easily. I met his eyes, steeling myself for his anger, and prayed that his body, weak and anguished as it was, would bate the fury of his spirit. For I gave him challenge.
“Why do you call my father these things?” I demanded. “It was he who raised up this kingdom from the grip of the Geats and the Scyldings. He who drove out the raiders from the sea, and the enemy from the north and the east. He was counted a great warrior and leader of men. Say why you dishonor his name, in this hall he raised to defend his people.”
He leapt to his feet, eyes blazing in the instant. He seized me and dragged me up to stare into my eyes with murderous challenge. Then he flung me from him, staggering to the bed, as he cried his answer with anger and grief.
“He who fought the Geats and the Scyldings? He who drove out the raiders from the sea? He who took the blows of their swords and the hard clash of the spear?” His voice rose to a raging snarl, a fury beyond words, and he struck blindly at the walls and the furnishings, his bare hands splintering wood and striking great rents in the furs and hangings.
“Curse him!” he howled. “Curse him and all his line! Foul, false, coward king! Thief and betrayer!”
He turned upon me, and my heart shrunk at the feral hatred in his eyes. His lips drew back from his teeth, and he stalked toward me like a wolf to its kill.
“What handsbreadth of this hide has not felt the blows of your enemies? What pain and fierce clash of arms did I not suffer, that Aelfric might call his land safe? And what blow of spear or force of sword did he ever take in battle, when I was there to take it for him?”
His bitter cry seemed to scald his very flesh, and his rage bent so upon me that I felt him at any moment about to spring. At last he half-turned away, wrought with the struggle within him. His body shuddered with the force of it, and when he turned to face me again he panted with his effort to master himself as he tore the torc from his arm and flung it at my feet.
“In what battle was that won, king’s whelp? In what crush of foes was the red gold taken? I can tell, and I alone. Your coward sire lay crouched in his tent when I took that from the arm of Werna of the Scyldings. And when the battle was won and I lay near to death, with the host of the Scyldings laid about me in their blood, where was your father then? Where was the rich ring-giver, the leader of men, the shield in battle to guard his fallen friend?” His voice rose to an aching cry of betrayal. With all the hurt he had wrought on my body, I could not turn from him then. He shuddered, and his pain crushed down upon him until his voice dead and broken.
“He left me there, on the field of the dead.” His eyes half-closed in remembrance. So fierce was the anguish that ran through his body that I could not doubt him in any word. Then he turned upon me, the hatred blazing up again hot and sudden as his voice rose.
“He left me! No hand to soothe my injuries; no word to still a raging heart. No help for the fury of the blood – “ and here he broke off, struggling within himself. Whether to break in sobbing or lash out in murderous frenzy, his body was wracked with a passion that demanded release. He fell to his knees, his nails digging furrows in the oaken floor, then threw his head back in a savage howl of rage and anguish. When his eyes met mine again, the hard bright bloodlust was gleaming in them.
“Go.” He choked the word out as he rose, stalking toward me, his gaze grown nothing human as I backed to the chamber door. I did not dare turn my back to him.
“Go!” His shout was a ragged scream, and I fled, hearing the heavy bar of the door crash into place as the rising snarl of his rage ripped through the air.
I went to my sisters’ quarters and bathed, feeling their eyes upon me eyes as they gazed on the worst of his handiwork. Janna came to smooth my hair, her touch soothing though her hands trembled with the wild howls of rage and torment that echoed from the king’s chamber.
When his cries of fury had abated and the silence was broken only by a hard, heavy panting and the low sob of his breath, I brought a trencher of meat and bread and a horn of good ale. I touched the door with my palm, gathering my courage, but before I could knock he flung it open, glaring at me with his chest still heaving. He snatched the food from me, staring balefully, then slammed the door.
I then went to the hall and looked better on those who slunk in to man it. Like men in a house of mourning or cowards who meet to give over the battle, they sunk within themselves, not meeting any eye or speaking amongst themselves, nor taking the meat and bread that lay upon the boards. The doors of the hall stood open, and most of them lingered outside; in the yard the peasant folk had fled, preferring no doubt the hard road back to their homes to what raged and snarled within the hall. The bodies of the Geats were heaped already in a funeral pyre, smoldering in the morning sun, and all about the yard were gathered in piles their arms and armor, rings and arm-bands of twisted gold, waiting the claim of he who had slain them. Harulth’s armor alone was untouched; his plate and gauntlets lay where he had cast them, and the serfs who still remained by the hall shrank from them as they passed, and made signs to ward off evil.
I knew who I sought, and close by the fire I found him: Farric, my father’s brother, who had ridden with him to battle with the Geats and the Scyldings. He was sunk in gloom, hunched over a mead-horn. I brought him fresh drink and took my place by his elbow. He looked up, then down again, his eyes sliding from mine.
“Tell me of him, Farric.” I spoke straight and bold, willing the truth from him.
Farric shook his head. His face was sunken, his eyes dark; he had given himself to despair, and mumbled low and sullenly.
“You cannot know what you have loosed upon us. We would find more mercy amongst the Geats.”
“It is done, and past weeping. Tell me what I face.” I sought his eye, but he looked shrinking down into his drink. “What lies between this man and my father?”
Farric muttered to himself as he clutched at the horn of mead.
“No man. No man.”
My patience broke. He was always a weak man, Farric. He followed in my father’s train, eating well and drinking his fill, slow to the battle and a bad tongue in counsel. Now I had had enough of his sullen shrinking. I gripped his tunic and pulled him to me, forcing his eyes to mine.
“You will tell me. My people will not suffer for your cowardice.”
He struggled against me, his gaze darting about for escape. At last he met my eyes again, then looked about him pointedly. All through the hall men watched us, hunched over their ale or clustered in tight knots. Their faces were drawn in the morning light, and a deep uneasy murmur rose amongst them. I stood, pulling Farric with me, and walked with him to the guests’ chamber, empty now. I stood with my back against the door and faced him where he cringed in the room’s center.
“Speak. And do not be long about it.”
He sickened me, hunching there in his cowardice and his fawning tones. His reply was a pleading whine.
“It was not me who advised it! I knew we would rue this. I knew we would pay it.”
He stumbled to a halt. I met his eyes unflinching.
“He was the strength of your father’s arm. What deeds were laid to him were done by Harulth.” He saw my look of struck betrayal and hastened on. “The thing was known, but we kept it as best we could. You see how it would look, if it were known abroad – that the king himself did not fight in battle. You see how it would be taken!”
A sickness sank into my stomach. My father’s house was built on lies. All the tales of his might in battle, the strength of his arm and the reach of his spear – there was no truth in them.
“A king is a leader of men,” Farric said, wheedling now, pleading for favor. “He led well. He chose well. He chose his warrior, and worked his kingship through him.”
“Harulth. He chose Harulth.”
“No one knows where he found him. No man knew what he was. But he followed your father like a hound to its master, and no enemy could face him and live.” Farric moaned and wrung his hands together, his eyes widening with fear as he continued. “I warned him. I told him it was unwise. Unwise to put his trust in one man; unwise to spurn him once he had! But he was caught in the net of his making. Once beholden, he had no escape.”
“Why did he seek one? Why put Harulth from him?” But in my heart I half-guessed, and Farric only stared at me in horror .
“You can ask this? You who have seen what he is?” His voice shook. “He is nothing human. The bloodlust masters him, and the very rocks and trees are rent in his passing. No man of us could bide by him in battle; his fury burns the earth itself. He still knew friend from foe when he last walked among us, but look what he has become. He cannot judge even man from beast in his bloodrage. What king could give his name to that? What throne can be built on a monster’s slaughter?”
A sick loathing came over me for the thing that had been done, the calculated betrayal. Whatever Harulth was or would be, I was ashamed, that day, to be my father’s daughter.
“And yet my father took what he wanted,” I said, hearing the bitterness in my own voice, a faint echo of Harulth’s cry. “He set Harulth to the ruin of his enemies, built up this hall and its defenders – and then cast him out when the battle was done and the borders manned without him.”
Farric stared at me, amazed that I could defend him. His eyes were wide and his manner trembling.
“But … you see what he is! You see what he leaves in his wake!”
“I see that my father took that when it suited him, and left Harulth despised and abandoned when he had built his kingdom on his back.”
Farric shook his head. He came closer, shaking with wild fear and a shrinking boldness.
“You are blind still. Fool and girl!” He groaned in his frustration. “Do you think this rage comes only of a warrior cast out by his king? Do you think a man bound as champion alone would lie twenty years upon the marsh, biting his heart in hatred and envy? Do you think that is all that kept Harulth there?”
His voice dropped to a low, trembling vitality. “Think well upon this night past. Think what brought him from the fury of his wrath, slaked his bloodthirst and drew the heat of battle from him. Think what took the force of his rage. He was no different, Aelwyn, when last he walked among us. He craved no different thing when the battle was over.” He looked hard into my eyes, and now I could not meet his. He turned and put his hand to the door, muttering his last words.
“Now think who gave it to him.”
He left, shutting the door behind him. I caught at it for support as I slid down to the floor, hunching in upon myself.
Shanglan
*************************************************
Broken with burning in the Boar’s last winter,
Aelfric of the Aethelings met that axe-blade, Death.
No warrior’s way; he fell in fever,
and went down the whale-road in his wide-prowed ship.
Last son of his line, he left women lamenting;
Aelwyn, daughter, in duty fierce,
Held the hall and sought help most dire.
As ravens rose in ravening clouds
and flocked to the fort to feast on mens’ blood,
her people cried hunger, her enemy harried,
and her war-band broke and betrayed their king.
Driven dire, she took desperate roads –
sought pact for peace, and paid its price.
This is her tale.
Three days had not passed since my father’s death when the storm broke upon us. His warriors fled, his gold still weighting them as they scattered. The Geats, long our enemies, rode from the north; from the east, the Scyldings, eager for land. Between sword and sea we lay helpless, men running from the hall like water. I, Aelwyn, mustered the handful of who remained and prepared to die in the hall’s defense.
In the yard our men strove upon the paling, bracing the spear-fence to hold the foe. The Geats knew how weak we lay; they would break the heart of the land and then lay spoil as they would. In the hall my sisters crouched amongst their spinning, looking to the north with a sick dread. I had taken the way of the warrior queens, learning the sword, the shield, and the spear. But they longed to be women and live in peace. They had looked to marry kings and princes, but fate and my father’s sudden death found them without hall, home, or husband.
Three days ago my father’s body was laid in his funeral barge, sent with song and mourning into the sea, a gift to the gods. Two days past the men who had feasted in his hall, taken his gold and sung his praises began to slip from us. One day past the Geats were worrying the borders; this morning we dug into the ground to make a desperate stand. Before night the earth would be wet with our blood, and my own sword must strike down my sisters or leave them to be taken as spoil of battle, slaves forever. This would come to pass, if no other aid could be found.
I looked out over the fields, away to where the marsh lay like a shadow on the horizon. I went to ride.
He dwelt on the edge of the fen, shunned and shunning. He had love for no man; he fought for no lord or king, yet lived in his sullen silence, and wrought misery on any who troubled his solitude. All about him by marsh’s edge the land lay barren, sunken, and empty. He had an evil name but dwelt untroubled, and this was why: he was reckoned a deadly man, more fierce than the wolf in winter that spares the sheep and strikes the shepherd. They swore no sword could bite him, so fierce was his fury in battle, and men scattered before him like water from a dish. He fought alone, heedless of his hide, like a man who wished to die – or could not.
A score of years before he had ridden with my father, raging wild upon his enemies. Then he left his hall with a shadow upon him and come to dwell here, a wary silence between them. I knew nothing of what had banished him from us. I feared what I might find. Yet his arm had been known from seawall to mountain and never felt defeat. That was all I need know.
I left my horse when the marsh began to give way beneath it and made my way on to the hovel, sinking with every step. His gaze was upon me before I reached the door; I half saw his glittering eye before he stepped from the shadow and barred my path.
“You’ve lost your way.”
His voice was harsh, unused to speech. His black hair hung down as rough as a pelt, and his long, ranging body sloped toward me taut with power. His face was strange and young; though he had ridden with my father’s war-band before I was born, he looked no older than I.
“This is no land to wander,” he said. “Turn back and take another path.”
I answered him levelly, meeting eyes as gray as the winter tide. “My path is right, if you are Harulth.”
His lips twitched back in a sneer or a snarl. Then his hand shot out to grip my wrist as I felt for my dagger. I ground my teeth and met his gaze.
“Who are you to call me by that name?” His voice was rougher now, with a low, feral note.
“I am Aelwyn, daughter of Aelfric, who has suffered you to live upon this land. He has given you this roof and the fields about. I call you to defend his lands and yours.”
He laughed, a short, bitter bark of contempt, and looked about the mire and the half-sunk ruin of the hut.
“He has given to me these riches, that no one could want or seek to take? He has suffered me to live, who feared to meet me in battle though he had a dozen men beside?” He pushed me back from him, so that I struggled to keep my feet. “And now his whelp demands the price of his cowardice? Let her take it.” He bared his teeth and he drew his blade in a rush.
I brought my sword up. His swift-risen anger burned wild in his eyes, so that I dared not turn my back to him. But more – without his blade, we died that night. My sisters and all my people. I must face him here; I would win or die as I had lived, my father’s daughter and a queen deserving.
We met hard in a sudden clash. He sprang from a wary crouch to strike my buckler with a force that left my arm numb and hanging, the shield half-riven. I dug my feet into the shifting ground, striving to force his blade over and away. Then I saw how his wild blow had left his flank all undefended, and I struck at him. He wore no armor; his skin showed naked in the gap of the rags that were all his clothing. So I saw it as clearly as day.
The sword turned from his flesh. I gave him a blow that must have been the death of him, a low swift thrust that shot beneath his arm and made straight to nestle below his ribs. But my blade glanced from his flesh as if it had been steel. I stood an instant gaping; he swung the hilt of his sword and caught me a heavy blow under the chin that threw me down and rattled the teeth in my head. Then he was on me with a feral leap, pinning me to the oozing ground that began to close about me. He brought his face down close to mine and spoke as his sword’s edge dug against my neck.
“And now, Aelfric’s whelp, tell me why I should spare you. Think well on your words, for I have no mind to see you rise again.”
His grip was like iron, and the wet earth closed about my neck as he leaned his weight into me. I choked out a word as he pressed me down to my death.
“Honor.”
He laughed again, that harsh bark more bitter than his curses – but answered, and stayed his hand as he did.
“What honor do I have, hunted like a dog from hovel to hovel, scouring the border of the marsh, despised of your king and his band of mighty drinkers? What honor is given to me, that I should spare you for it?”
“Not the honor you have,” I said, forcing the words past the ache of my bruised throat. “The honor you will take.” His eyes narrowed. I spoke on, struggling with the weight of him still on my chest. “You judge them right. They fled when the ale grew scant and the enemy near. Hardly a fourth part of them remain – the old, the young, and the feeble. None but you can save them; none but yours, the honor.”
“None but mine the risk and venture.” His lip curled. “And what will I have of it when I am done? This marsh and this hovel. I know your ways, king’s spawn,” he said, and a ragged bitterness came into his voice. His eyes were gray and wild like winter. “You speak fine words now, but in the heat of battle I will stand alone, taking the blows and the hard spear’s strike. And when the blood lies cooling about me, and I half dead with the crush of the fight, then I will find myself outcast once more. No!” he cried. “You will make no fool of me!” His grip tightened on my throat, and he dug the edge of his blade into my skin.
“I will not,” I gasped. “I swear it. What harm has been done you was not done by me. You will stand first among men at my hall, drink first from the horn in peace and take first of the spoils in war. No man will walk before you save the king himself, and no man’s word hold more weight, save he who sits upon the throne. You will be first in all things, and honored best amongst my people – if you will save them. I will swear this by any oath you name.”
He thought long upon this, his blade still digging painfully into my skin. At last he spoke.
“What king is this will walk before me?” His voice was a low growl, his eyes narrowed. I swallowed, feeling the sword’s edge draw blood from my throat. I prayed that I did right for my people. I prayed that I did not deliver them to a fate worse than the Geats.
“What king I will take. Aelfric leaves no son. I am the oldest of his line.”
He flung aside the sword and grabbed my chin, forcing my head back. He crouched to my throat and breathed in deeply, then darted his tongue to lick where his blade had dug into my flesh. I shuddered, but he took no heed – only threw back his head, closed his eyes, and made a low moan to himself.
“Blood of the king. It is true.”
He turned back to me, sudden and wild. He gripped my throat, and his eyes met mine hot and savage.
“Daughter of Aelfric. Do you know what your kin have been to me?”
I shook my head, helpless to speak. He leaned close until his breath brushed my ear as he snarled his words.
“Rats in winter. Plague in a year of famine. The fire that sweeps in the wake of plunder. All things evil, your line has been to me.”
I struggled for my voice, his grip crushing down upon my throat until I could only croak in strangled gasps.
“What my kin have done, let me put right. I will pay the blood price. Name your injuries; I will pay them.”
He gave a howl of rage, and in a sudden fury lashed at the earth by my head. His bare hand clawed a furrow like a plow blade’s, and he snarled in his hatred.
“What price will you pay, miserable get of a lying cur? What price my vengeance?”
He shuddered with the bitterness that welled in him, and I saw then why he was feared, shunned, scarce spoken of above a whisper. The wrath that shook his frame was a scream against the lash that scarred him; he would wreak his pain upon anything that crossed him. What had burned this torment into his heart, I could not guess; what part my kin had played in it, I dreaded to know, so wild were his hatred and despair. For I had learned this from my father: blood can only be paid with blood. Gold may be laid on the counting board, the wergeld set and granted in full – yet hearts that loved with truth and passion cannot be paid in gold. Whatever hurt my kin had done him, Harulth would be paid in blood – and there was none but mine to pay it.
But there would be blood for the Geats if I brought no one to defend our hall. I do not call my choice courage; I faced death every way I looked. But if my death alone would spare my people and leave my sisters safe – then my death alone would be given. I spoke as levelly as I could, meeting the wild vengeance of his gaze.
“I will give anything mine, gold as you will, or blood itself. Save our folk this night, and whatever you name will be yours.”
His hands gripped hard on my body so that I felt them to the bone. He crouched closer, lips drawing back over his teeth, and I thought he would slay me there, torn to the throat. Then his eyes lighted, and he drew back a handsbreadth. His gray gaze grew wise and cruel. At last he spoke, low, rough, and with fierce intent.
“I would be king. King before all men. King as was Aelfric. You will take me before them all and give me honor.”
“I will do it.” I would pay this price if it spared my folk, though I shuddered under his hand. Better that one should suffer than many. Better that I should bear the force of his vengeance then my people meet the swords of the Geats.
“You will be my queen. Under my hand.” He crouched close on my chest, like a beast at its kill. “What your father cast forth from his hall, you will take to your throne and your bed.” His words were a low hiss, the rage lashing just beneath. I nodded. I would do even this – for my people. His eyes lighted with triumph, and I turned my face away. All my life I had known that I would be sold to bind some alliance, and go to the bed of a stranger. This was no worse. I could not dream of more.
He lowered his head to my throat, licking the blood his sword had drawn. His teeth closed on the skin as he growled, his hands already moving upon my body with fierce intent.
“I will have a pledge of you, king’s get. I will have proof that you give me no lies.” His hands closed on my dress. He dragged at the neck of it while he glared down, daring me to refuse.
I closed my eyes and nodded, trying to still my body’s protest. With a fierce cry of victory he tore at the cloth, baring my breasts in a brutal rush that forced a moan from me though I fought it. He took no heed but dropped his head to bite and paw at my body, cruel in his grip upon it. His teeth closed on my flesh and he moaned to himself in low, coarse, animal groans, his hands still digging at my gown. He tore it half down the skirts, taking a vicious pleasure in the rending as he savaged my breasts until I could not but groan with pain. He snarled and gripped my throat again, his grasp closing until I scarce could draw breath.
“Puling get of a weak king! Do not cry to me for mercy.”
I bit down on my tongue, choking back the cries from his brutal onslaught. He dug his hand into my hair and dragged my head back, and with the other yanked open my torn skirts and laid my body bare. He sneered at the shudder I could not suppress, then spat where my thighs joined and the hair grew close and darker gold. Shame welled hot within me; he spat again, then pushed a rough finger against my body. As he forced it into me, I dug my nails into the earth to keep from crying out. His eyes narrowed and he drove deeper, relishing my suffering and shame. Twisting his touch cruelly within me, he lowered his head to my thighs and then pulled roughly out, closing his eyes and breathing in the scent from his hands and my body. A shudder ran through him. When he opened his eyes they burned with a wild, heedless light.
“You are what a queen should be, going to her wedding bed. I will take your pledge, Aelfric’s whore.”
He crushed down upon me, pinning my limbs as he freed his naked length. I closed my eyes and clenched my fists, but could not help a wracking shudder as he forced my body open. I had not known man before, and this was no gentle one, but a savage creature who thrust into me and plundered as he would. He dug his hands into my thighs and forced them wide as he sheathed himself, rending my maidenhead in a hard, hungry rush. He drove deep and left me trembling as he bit at my breasts fiercely enough to leave bruises and broken skin beneath his teeth. He built fast to a frenzy, rutting hard and frantic until he threw his head back with a long jagged cry of release. I felt it through me, the hot pulse of his victory, and I turned my head in shame, sick to my heart with the feel of him. When he had done he threw himself aside, pulling roughly from me to lay panting. At length he rose as I pulled together the tatters of my skirts and struggled up from the reeking mire that was become the bed of my womanhood.
He gave me a swift, sneering glance, his eyes filled with a bitter contempt. But when he turned he went into the hut, and when he came forth he was armored and carried a sword and shield. He looked at me, his gaze wild and driven still.
“Tonight your hall will lie in safety. Look to it you welcome me as befits a king to be wedded.”
I shuddered, not turning as I picked my way over the marsh to my horse.
When I came to the yard I rode hard to the horse-shed, clutching my torn dress to hide my shame. The warriors left to us milled about in confusion, but I stalked through them to the hall as swiftly as I could. I saw how their eyes lingered on me, the great rents in my robes and the mire that clung to my skin and hair. I hastened to the women’s quarters and shot the bar of my sisters’ chambers, the only refuge I could find. They huddled there, staring, until I caught my shadow in the polished steel mirror and saw how I must look – a shambling figure in ragged clothing and the reek of the swamp, the sword still at my belt and a wild light in my eyes. I flushed and turned to speak to them.
“I have found a champion who will put the foe to flight. But I have of your skills, that I know little of.” They stared, and I felt the blood rise hot to my cheeks. “I wed tonight. Join with me to do him honor.”
They came to me then, my sisters – Aelethe, Freyna, and Janna, with her soft brown eyes and her kind face. She was the youngest, and the dearest to my heart, for she always knew my moods. Now she kissed my cheek and touched me with a gentle hand, and I saw that she knew, no less than the others, what price had bought the safety of the house. Aelethe and Freyna were near sunken with horror, but Janna gave me a tenderness – her love for me, and her love of the sacrifice I would make for her. Aelethe and Freyna, when they had their wits about them, ran to fetch clothing, gold rings and rich jewels, and set the serving women scurrying for wood and water that they might bathe me. But Janna brought wine warmed with spices and sat by my hand stroking my hair and gently combing the tangled mire from it.
“Whence comes this warrior, whose arm will save us? Tell us how we may honor him, who takes our dear sister to wife.” Her voice was low and she was quiet in her ways – in no wise a warrior, but there was strength in her gentle touch. In this she won honor: that she spoke gently, and served softly, and loved well, when it took more courage than a man would need in battle. She knew what my ruin meant, but she had faith in her love; she would bring this man, by strength of her goodness, to kindness to her sister. She could not know what she faced; nothing would turn that bitter grey tide, that fierce, wild vengeance. But she would strive, though warriors grown would cower away from him. She would meet him in a battle of her own.
“He lies close by the marsh,” I told her, and shut my lips. Her eyes widened; she saw my meaning. But I would not make it inarguable, not while Aelethe and Freyna worked busily and missed our words. Soon enough they would see the truth; for now they might be spared this final blow.
Janna nodded. Her hand closed softly over mine, and I saw how her tears welled for me, until I must look away or weep myself. I would not yield; no warrior sobs for his wounds from battle, and I would not weep for this.
“He will be a strong king to us,” she said. “He has as fine a queen as ever we have known.”
I gripped her hand, staring ahead. I would not let tears fall.
They groaned when I drew my garment from me and they saw the track of his grip upon my body. Even Aelethe, who was always cool and close with herself, took my neck gently with her hand and pressed her brow to mine, mute with grief before the bruises that darkened my skin and the blood and mire smeared upon my thighs. Freyna drove the serving women from the room, and then they took my hands, my sisters, and helped me themselves to the water drawn to bathe me. They were gentle, the pride and slights of our youth cast aside as they eased me to the water that stung where his teeth had torn. They brought soap and sweet herbs to cleanse my body and worked upon my hair to wash the mud and the smell of the marsh from it. Janna brought wine again, warm to the stomach, and herself washed gently from me the stain of blood upon my thighs – the mark of what he had taken. She cradled my head to her breast as I grew loose and weary with the wine, and held me there softly as Aelethe and Freyna scrubbed at my skin with stiff brushes of boars’ hair, cleaning my hands and my feet.
At last I rose from the water. I sat by the fire, Janna combing my hair and fanning it to dry as Aelethe and Freyna dressed me. They brought the finest we had: rich cloth brightly dyed and wrought with fine stitching, heavy arm-bands and rings of twisted gold. I scarce could meet their eyes as they put the riches upon me; who knew what ruin he would make of the fine bright things? I forced my mind from it, and from the thought of how he would take his way with my body beneath the finery. If our people lay safe – if the wretched serfs and drudges who even now streamed into the hall pleading for safety, were given it – he might do what he will. Yet the fear was cold within me. What if he cheated his bargain? What if he took everything before him? What battle could we give him? What resistance could we make? I dug my nails into my palms and set my face, straightening under the heavy the gold. I would show no fear. I had done all I could. I would die in the struggle to save the hall, and none could ask more of me than that.
When my sisters’ work was complete, we sat a space in silence. They would not ask what they dreaded; I would not say it. Then long and low came a moan from the hall – a hound groaning its fear and loathing. The cries of the horses rang out from the yard, and I rose, knowing what drove them. I passed through the broad doors of the women’s chambers and into the hall itself.
The dogs’ howls rose to a clamor. They stood with their ruffs stiff about their necks, their ears laid back and lips drawn in nervous snarls. They backed to the shadows, half-sick with fear and hatred of what came, and the men looked up with pale faces as they sought their weapons. They thought that the Geats had come swift across the plain – but I knew what trod the stones of the stableyard, and I would meet it as befit a queen and a warrior. I passed through the benches with a swift step and flung wide the great iron-bound doors of the hall.
He stood there in the yard, the poor mute peasants who thronged the gates shrinking away on every side. The horses, tied fast to the rail, danced frantically and shuddered away from him, their eyes rolling white. He wore the armor he had donned at his hut, a heavy plate of strange design and gauntlets whose steel banding bore etchings that writhed in the light of the sinking sun. His sword he bore naked in his hand, and along its blade a grey light flickered and ran like water. His shield was blank, covered in a black hide with no device or allegiance, and his mantel was made of the skins of wild beasts, half-tanned and tangling with the black pelt of his hair. Over his brow gleamed the dull steel of a helmet, wrought to fantastic likeness of the head of a snarling wolf. Beneath it shone his bitter eyes, gray as the tide and more remorseless. He swept the hall with the glance of a wolf crouched upon a lamb. Then his eyes lighted upon me and he spoke.
“What welcome do you make me, Aelwyn daughter of Aelfric, king of the Aethelings? What welcome does Harulth find in the hall of the warm and well-fed people?”
I fought down the anger that rose at his taunt, for I saw in his bearing how he longed for havoc. There was a well of hatred in him, venom brimming in his brooding gaze. He sought any slight that would bring the blade from his side and set him loose upon my people. I would master myself, and see that he was not given it.
“Welcome, Harulth, first in battle, first in counsel, first to walk within the hall.” I kept my voice low and even, walking toward him with my hands open. “Welcome king. Welcome husband.”
A gasp and murmur ran through the people, a low groan of fear in the handful of warriors left to stand at my back. Harulth’s eyes lighted triumphantly, and he drew himself taller, prouder than the skulking slouch he’d worn to the door. As he stalked into the hall he glared at man and beast until the warriors dropped their eyes to the floor and the fiercest of the hounds slunk to the shadows, showing its teeth but pressing its tail between its legs. He took my hand, raising it to show his conquest, and spoke with fierce defiance.
“We are wed. By the word of the queen. By the word of he who is now her king. Let any man speak who wills it otherwise.”
He glanced about the hall, still in that hot, eager thirst for slaughter that sent the women trembling to the corners and the men shameful to the benches. He bared his teeth in a mirthless grin and took up a horn of ale.
“Drink! Drink to your champion. Drink to your king.”
He watched the men with an evil eye, and they took up the horns and roused a weak cheer, though one or two sought my gaze in anguish. I held myself strong, although his hand crushed mine within it. The truth of the bargain would be seen this night. Already the yard thronged with those who fled the enemy; they could not be far from the gates. Harulth gulped the ale and dragged his gauntlet over his lips. He looked upon me for a long moment, the fierce joy of vengeance still in his eye, then turned to face the hall, his voice fierce and intent.
“Let no man stir from the hall this night. Let the rabble without look well to themselves, and keep within the paling. Whatever you care for, man, beast, or burden, keep it within the gates of the yard or give it up for lost. Whatever you hear, however bold you think yourselves –“ and here he sneered at the warriors who would not meet his gaze – “do not venture out, or you mark yourself my enemy. The Geats will find no mercy this night; nor will you, if you set foot beyond the gate.”
The men turned half-sullen at this speech, muttering amongst themselves. The oldest of them, those who had ridden with my father in his youth, turned pale and made signs to ward off evil. The younger men glared and looked to each other for strength, but none had the courage to challenge him. Harulth stared them down man by man, taking a pleasure in the way their eyes dropped as he turned to each. He made a slow sweep of the hall and lighted at last on me. I fought to keep my chin raised and my face open. I met his gaze, and would not look away.
“You,” he hissed, his expression darkening. He grabbed my neck, half-staggering me as he forced my head down. I could not resist his arm – but I looked up at him still, eye to eye, and he snarled and shoved me back. I heard a gasp and felt a touch on my arm, and sensed more than saw that Janna caught me, with Aelethe and Freyna close behind, stepping up to attend their queen with a courage that thrilled my heart. I closed my hand upon Janna’s as I saw his eyes flick down to her, the unthinking rage blooming in them. Then he raised them to me again, wild and bitter, and spat out his words.
“You will be sent for. My mark is upon you, and you will know my call. Leave your fine rings and your gold behind; come naked to the gates when you are called for. Heed this, for if I do not know you, you are but a dead woman.” His eyes narrowed, and his lip curled as he raked me with a contemptuous glance. “You will slake my thirst, or your people will suffer for it.”
A moan ran through the women of the hall, and the men looked ashamed of their fear and silence. But I met his eyes, determined I should show myself no coward. Janna’s hand closed tight upon mine and I thought of her standing there behind me, her soft brown eyes willing honor in this creature in a battle as fierce as any meeting of blades. I struggled to think how Janna would show her courage in my place, and the answer came to me in the instant.
“I will come to your call.” I slid from my shoulder the largest of the arm-rings, a torc of twisted gold won by my father in the lands of the Scyldings many winters past. I raised it to him as I stooped to one knee, bowing my head and fighting to bring my voice level. “May fate preserve my husband, and bring him safe to his hall. May this token guard his life and guide his arm in strength of battle.”
His eyes blazed with fury, and he snatched the ring from my hands. He moved as if to strike me, a murderous anger deep in his gaze as he searched my face for a sign of mockery. Janna’s strength rose up within me; I met his eyes unflinching and put into all my being the will that he should return in truth, safe from the crush of battle. I willed it so strongly that my heart began to open to it, and he stumbled in confusion, dropping the hand he had raised to strike me. With a snarl, he stalked from the hall – but the torc gleamed red upon his arm in the light of the setting sun.
We held the gates open as long as we could, sending men running to hasten the peasants who fled the coming of the Geats. As the sun sank lower Harulth raged amongst them and drove them running from their carts and bundles to seek the shelter of the yard. The men who ranged the paling looked to me in anger, as if I should curb the vicious haste with which he scattered them before him. But I could not fault him. Over the hills the ravens were massing in clouds of eager omen, and soon – too soon – in the falling dusk the lights stood out upon the slope, and came on with a rush and a rumor. Then a great wail went up from those still outside the gates and they surged forward, crushing men before them as they fled in terror. Harulth stood his ground, raging and striking at them with the flat of his blade, beating them from him and cursing them for fools. But I saw this: his hand reached down to the ground. He stooped as the flood broke about him, and when he raised himself up, half-swept from his feet in the rush of their flight, he brought a child with him. He flung it into a cart, savage in his gesture and fierce in his hunger for battle – but the child landed safe.
As the last of the throng fled into the yard, Harulth came hot at their heels, driving them before him. He looked up to the gatesmen, the thunder of the Geats’ coming now heavy on the hill, and cried out in a wild, ragged howl.
“Bar the gates! Damn any man still without, and damn the man who opens ‘ere I tell him!”
The crowd within surged forward with the gatesmen and pushed the gates to, dragging home the great oaken bar. Harulth watched them close as they did. Then, as the bar shot home, he turned and flew up the hill, roaring his challenge to the Geats as he plunged into the milling dusk. The darkness fell ‘round him as he ran to meet the thunder of their hooves, but soon enough we knew what he wrought there.
The screaming of their horses came to us first, high shrieks of terror that struck ice into our hearts. Then the cries of men rose up – not the deep, rolling chants of battle, but screams of mortal fear and anguish. Mothers crushed their children to them, covering their ears and sobbing against them for very horror as the shrieks rent the air. Their voices rose up from the battlefield, sobbing in pain and terror, crying out to their comrades in desperate need, begging for mercy in helpless pleas soon torn short. Under it all rose a terrible cry, a snarling frenzy like the voice of hungry death itself loose amongst the Geats. They had come to plunder, to lay low all that sheltered us – and yet we pitied them, in that darkness.
How long they suffered, no man of us can tell. I know only that at length, the men of the Geats lay silent – and yet the dread clangor rang out still, the awful track of a beast run wild in its rage. The women screamed and the warriors trembled at their arms; still, no man dared mount the paling to see what stalked below. As it crashed through the lines of abandoned goods, a boar started up with a long squealing scream; it was cut off close to the gates, and in the rattle of its death-cry a great blow struck the gate itself, struck and fell with a slithering thump. The people moaned with one voice, a wail of helpless terror, and the horses tore frantically at their rail, dragging it nearly from its posts. The foam stood out on their flanks, and in the light of the rising moon their eyes rolled white and wild.
Then a howl broke out, a long ragged cry that sank freezing into the heart. It was a cry of anguish, of hatred and vengeance, of a bitter rage so deep and despairing that I knew in the instant who spoke from the field of battle. I knew who called, and hastened to the gate.
The stones were cold beneath my feet as I threw off my shoes and flung the gold swiftly from my arms. There was no time to think upon the eyes that watched me. What I went to, I feared with such numb sickness at heart that I thought nothing of the eyes of men. I pulled the rings from my fingers, dropping them to the stones, and fumbled at the catches of the dress as he howled again, long, jagged, louder now and closer. Aelethe and Freyna came to me, taking the garments as I flung them off, and half-spoke as if to plead. I shook my head, dropping the last work of mens’ hands from my body, and met Janna’s eyes as they filled with tears and she nodded her head. I did not know what he might do to my body, whether to plunder or to destroy. But the Geats lay dead all along the hill, of this I had no doubt – and between my people and the fury of what had laid them there, there was only me.
“Aelwyn! Send her!” The voice from without was ragged and wild, the cry of a man driven to utter desperation. I ran to the small door by the gate, the guard half-wishing to fight me – not, I saw in his white-circled eyes, to save me, but that he would not open the gate to what he knew lay without. I pushed past him and slipped through it, shutting it behind me and hearing the bolt slam home. Then I looked out upon the field of battle.
No living thing met my eye. By the gates lay the carcass of the boar whose death had carried to our ears, the ground around it soaked in a pool of blood. A great red burst upon the gate showed where it had struck, near a man’s height above the ground. All about the paling, where I could see in the torchlight, lay the bodies of men, horses, sheep, swine – whatever had lain outside the gates. Some were cleaved by the sword – I saw a warrior of the Geats with his leg cut clean from him, though the blow had been struck in the broadest part. But I saw as well men whose throats were torn open, their faces fixed still in terror, and the bodies of horses ripped through the belly, their guts strewn in a frenzy. I shuddered, the rank smell of the blood rising up to me. I had seen battle before, and what followed it – but this was carnage.
He was there, crouched in the ruins of the battle, awash with blood to his very hair and panting with the fury that drove him. He made a low moan in his throat as he raised his gaze to mine, and as our eyes met he stood rigid, locked in some fierce struggle within.
I took a step toward him, a step that cost me all the courage I had. He cried out, a howl of pain and frustration, and fell to his knees, smiting upon the ground until he tore it into furrows. He turned his head from me and shuddered through his body, his chest heaving and his fists clenched in the battle that tore him. I watched, sunk in the horror of it. Then at last he turned, a baleful light blazing from his grey eyes, and made for me.
He was over the field and upon me before I could offer any defense. He flung me against the wall, his hands digging into my body, and his eyes met mine wild, furious, and nothing human. I closed my eyes and gave my spirit up to the gods.
“Aelwyn.” His voice was a growl, his eyes lighting with hot intent. He stared at me as he held me there, shuddering through his body as if his very frame was torn from within. Panting with effort, he narrowed his eyes as if to force them to see me, and he snarled my name again.
“Aelwyn!” He lunged forward, gripping my hair as he sunk his mouth to my throat and bit fiercely at the skin. He moaned and growled to himself as his teeth dug into my flesh, his body pressing hard against mine as he rent his armor frantically from him. I closed my eyes and laid my head back, opening my throat to him. He growled in fierce response and crushed his body to mine, pinning me against the rough posts of the spear-wall. He savaged my breasts, seizing the flesh fiercely as I fought not to struggle. I dared not thwart him, with the proof of his power laid all about me. I could not unleash upon my people the force that had strewn the Geats upon the hillside. I laid my body open to him and he took it with a fierce and violent hunger, little more than a beast in his raging fury with the blood of the battle soaking his skin. Yet in the worst rush of it, as his breath panted hot upon my neck, I heard beneath his savage growl a sobbing note of desperation.
In an instant it was gone, torn away like a leaf in a storm. Crushing me to the palings, he lifted me from my feet with an ease that terrified me. He bared his shaft in a swift hard motion and ground against my body, snarling and biting at my breasts as he lifted me over his jutting length. In a moment he had buried himself in me, pinning me to the rough wood of the fence as he drove into my body. Vital, savage, and intent, he thrust hard and frantically. I clung to him for balance as he took my breast in his teeth, closed them sharp upon it and shook his head with a fierce growl. I could no longer hold back a cry of pain; at that he sank his teeth harder and snarled, a rising cry of hunger and pleasure as he savaged my flesh. He wrenched another gasping sob of pain from me, then threw back his head with a taut, fierce joy and rutted hungrily into me. At last he thrust home, forcing my body down hard upon his shaft, and gave a ragged shout of triumph and release. His hands gripped me with bruising strength as he shuddered against my body, and I moaned as he burst within me.
He threw me aside, panting, and staggered against the paling to cling there. For an instant his eyes met mine. He groaned, and in that moment I saw his anguish, pain joined to loathing – loathing of me, that I saw him thus, but beneath it a bone-deep loathing of himself that bit deeper than any hatred for his fellow man. I looked at him in horror and, in truth, in pity, as he won free a moment from the haze of blood and fury. His voice was low, broken, and gasping.
“The thirst. Like fire!”
He struggled a moment in torment. But the hunger grew and burned in his eyes, and that terrible bitterness shone out again and turned on the world around him. He fell upon me, took my hair in his grip and dragged me to kneeling. He threw me forward upon my hands and thrust his fingers into my body, hard and rough, with a crooning groan of pleasure as I shuddered under his touch. He drew his fingers from me and licked them, then dropped to his knees. I trembled, feeling him move behind me as he stooped lower. He drew in his breath, scenting me as if he were in truth a beast. Then he moaned, and his tongue licked out and touched my body, lapping the slickness he had left upon my flesh. He growled by my ear as he reared up behind me, leaning forward over my body.
“My mark is upon you. Bitch. Bitch for my breeding.”
His words were a hot lash of contempt as he fell upon me. Yet he moaned as he pressed his hard shaft against my skin, and he clung a moment over my body, his naked chest pressed to my back. Then he gripped my thighs, digging in his nails as he forced them wide and entered me with a groan.
“Slut of Aelfric, how do you like your bargain?” He snarled in my ear as he plunged into me, brutal in the hard thrust and jerk of his loins. I closed my eyes and clung to the rough ground, trying to think of Janna. He dragged my head back by the hair, arching my body to force himself deeper, and growled as he took me savagely.
“Whore who sells her body for a mead hall. Do you like your bargain? Do you like your husband?” He bent close over my body, riding it harder until I scarce could keep to my hands and knees. “I will have you thus every night,” he hissed. “I will take you every evening, daughter of kings, in the very mead hall where your father cast me out. I will have his spirit rise and see how his daughter is grown my whore and bitch.”
He groaned, gripping my hips and driving into me harder still, making my body ache with the fierce thrust of his shaft. He dragged my head back, forcing my body taut to his, and rutted wildly until at last he growled and spat his seed into my body.
I cannot say how often he spent himself upon me that night. It blurred together in an aching, brutal durance. He came on me like a demon, driven from the fury of the battle to rut in a frenzy. By the time he dragged me, stumbling, into the hall, the blood of the battlefield was upon my skin, smearing my body where he’d cast me to the earth. He threw me down on the high table and licked the blood from my breasts and thighs, shuddering through his limbs and groaning to himself while the men huddled outside. One youth indeed, more brave or more foolish, fought to enter, but the others held him back and turned their faces as Harulth threw me over the table at the head, where my father’s great chair stood. He took me brutally on the board where my father’s meat and drink had lain, and howled his vengeance as he loosed his seed upon my loins. That I know clearly; the rest is a haze, like the thick of battle when the battle is won, a heap of shattered images from which no man may see aright.
I woke to pain. My body ached where he had ravaged it, so cruelly that I could scarcely rise. I lay the space of a breath or more and looked about, half-unconscious of where I lay or how I came there. I was in my father’s chamber. I lay on the bed, thrown naked on its covers. Below, in a spent heap by the fire, Harulth lay sprawled on the skins that strewed the floor.
I forced myself to rise, though my body protested. I could see with a glance the deep bruises and bites upon my skin, the long furrows where he had scratched and torn me, the blood that still streaked my flesh, some my own and some from the field of battle. There was pain deeper within as well; it sickened me to think what had lain upon me that night. I stumbled to the fire and drew water from the pot that hung by the coals. I threw herbs and wine into it to steep, then looked back at Harulth.
His body was smeared with the blood and mire of the battle, his ragged hair caked in it. He lay naked, only his upper arm bearing the ring of twisted gold that I had given him the night before. And now I saw what I had not seen in the torchlight last this night past – great bruises that bloomed over his body. They were deep-driven wounds, welling up black and purple with the blood beneath, some two handsbreaths wide and more. They were like nothing I had ever seen, some with the white mark of a sword’s blade or a spear’s point still clear upon them. Where the bruises faded, welts and weals covered his flesh, so that he was a thing hard to look upon. No man could take such wounds and live, though the bite of the blade was turned indeed. His body was battered near to death, and to a pain worse than mine if I judged it right.
His sword was there by him. Shame spoke to me; I knew what might be done as he lay in slumber, his body loosened from its taut fury. Even now he was but half in life, and half beyond it. To come on him at once, with many men, was to kill him.
I crossed the chamber and opened the doors. Then I bid the guards who waited there to bar the door, and let no man pass. Their eyes, shamed, lingered down my welts and bruises, and half questioned me. But I left them and went to my sisters’ quarters, and met Janna running to kiss me as I came through the door. I fell into a chair, and my sisters came to my aid. They brewed a healing draught, and rich broth, nourishing as befitted the wounded. They gave me drink, and cleansed the rents and wounds of my body. All the while they watched me, their eyes sick as they marked the hurt he’d done me. But they gave me no argument, and Janna’s eyes met mine with a pity true and intense as she brought soft robes and draped them about my body.
When I had eaten and drunk and felt my strength returning, I took up the broth and the healing draught and went to him, barring the door of the chamber behind me. I held the wooden bowl by his head, letting the scent of the broth drift to him as he lay deep in sleep. Gradually his slumber lightened, his nostrils fanned wide, and he woke in a swift, fierce rush.
He grabbed my wrist, slopping broth from the bowl as he lunged upright and looked about him as if to defend himself. He glared about the room, fierce for battle; then, finding no foe, he fixed his gaze on me. I held up, as well I could, the bowl of broth. He scowled and took it with ill grace, then held it to his nose and breathed its scent long and warily. At last he gulped it from the bowl, drinking hungrily until he threw the empty vessel aside. He looked up, his gaze touching the wounds upon my body. His eyes met mine and then slid away.
“Why are you here, spawn of Aelfric?” he growled. “What need do you have of me this morning?”
I thought of Janna, and offered him the horn with the healing draught.
“I come to see you tended, lord, and your wounds healed.”
He snatched the horn and smelled it warily, his eyes close upon me. “What witchery is brewed in this? Would you spare your cowards the task of butchering me in my sleep?” He sneered and made as if to fling it from him. I stopped his hand.
“Give it to me. I will drink it.” I met his eyes and saw them sink a moment, looking over my body. I had need of healing, near as much as he did, and my injuries shamed that part of him that still knew shame. He let go the horn, and I drank from it before handing it to him. His gaze met mine for a long moment; then he drank, draining the horn and casting it away.
“Why bring me this? What game are you playing, daughter of the weak arm and the coward’s heart?”
My blood rose, but I would not let him bait me so easily. I met his eyes, steeling myself for his anger, and prayed that his body, weak and anguished as it was, would bate the fury of his spirit. For I gave him challenge.
“Why do you call my father these things?” I demanded. “It was he who raised up this kingdom from the grip of the Geats and the Scyldings. He who drove out the raiders from the sea, and the enemy from the north and the east. He was counted a great warrior and leader of men. Say why you dishonor his name, in this hall he raised to defend his people.”
He leapt to his feet, eyes blazing in the instant. He seized me and dragged me up to stare into my eyes with murderous challenge. Then he flung me from him, staggering to the bed, as he cried his answer with anger and grief.
“He who fought the Geats and the Scyldings? He who drove out the raiders from the sea? He who took the blows of their swords and the hard clash of the spear?” His voice rose to a raging snarl, a fury beyond words, and he struck blindly at the walls and the furnishings, his bare hands splintering wood and striking great rents in the furs and hangings.
“Curse him!” he howled. “Curse him and all his line! Foul, false, coward king! Thief and betrayer!”
He turned upon me, and my heart shrunk at the feral hatred in his eyes. His lips drew back from his teeth, and he stalked toward me like a wolf to its kill.
“What handsbreadth of this hide has not felt the blows of your enemies? What pain and fierce clash of arms did I not suffer, that Aelfric might call his land safe? And what blow of spear or force of sword did he ever take in battle, when I was there to take it for him?”
His bitter cry seemed to scald his very flesh, and his rage bent so upon me that I felt him at any moment about to spring. At last he half-turned away, wrought with the struggle within him. His body shuddered with the force of it, and when he turned to face me again he panted with his effort to master himself as he tore the torc from his arm and flung it at my feet.
“In what battle was that won, king’s whelp? In what crush of foes was the red gold taken? I can tell, and I alone. Your coward sire lay crouched in his tent when I took that from the arm of Werna of the Scyldings. And when the battle was won and I lay near to death, with the host of the Scyldings laid about me in their blood, where was your father then? Where was the rich ring-giver, the leader of men, the shield in battle to guard his fallen friend?” His voice rose to an aching cry of betrayal. With all the hurt he had wrought on my body, I could not turn from him then. He shuddered, and his pain crushed down upon him until his voice dead and broken.
“He left me there, on the field of the dead.” His eyes half-closed in remembrance. So fierce was the anguish that ran through his body that I could not doubt him in any word. Then he turned upon me, the hatred blazing up again hot and sudden as his voice rose.
“He left me! No hand to soothe my injuries; no word to still a raging heart. No help for the fury of the blood – “ and here he broke off, struggling within himself. Whether to break in sobbing or lash out in murderous frenzy, his body was wracked with a passion that demanded release. He fell to his knees, his nails digging furrows in the oaken floor, then threw his head back in a savage howl of rage and anguish. When his eyes met mine again, the hard bright bloodlust was gleaming in them.
“Go.” He choked the word out as he rose, stalking toward me, his gaze grown nothing human as I backed to the chamber door. I did not dare turn my back to him.
“Go!” His shout was a ragged scream, and I fled, hearing the heavy bar of the door crash into place as the rising snarl of his rage ripped through the air.
I went to my sisters’ quarters and bathed, feeling their eyes upon me eyes as they gazed on the worst of his handiwork. Janna came to smooth my hair, her touch soothing though her hands trembled with the wild howls of rage and torment that echoed from the king’s chamber.
When his cries of fury had abated and the silence was broken only by a hard, heavy panting and the low sob of his breath, I brought a trencher of meat and bread and a horn of good ale. I touched the door with my palm, gathering my courage, but before I could knock he flung it open, glaring at me with his chest still heaving. He snatched the food from me, staring balefully, then slammed the door.
I then went to the hall and looked better on those who slunk in to man it. Like men in a house of mourning or cowards who meet to give over the battle, they sunk within themselves, not meeting any eye or speaking amongst themselves, nor taking the meat and bread that lay upon the boards. The doors of the hall stood open, and most of them lingered outside; in the yard the peasant folk had fled, preferring no doubt the hard road back to their homes to what raged and snarled within the hall. The bodies of the Geats were heaped already in a funeral pyre, smoldering in the morning sun, and all about the yard were gathered in piles their arms and armor, rings and arm-bands of twisted gold, waiting the claim of he who had slain them. Harulth’s armor alone was untouched; his plate and gauntlets lay where he had cast them, and the serfs who still remained by the hall shrank from them as they passed, and made signs to ward off evil.
I knew who I sought, and close by the fire I found him: Farric, my father’s brother, who had ridden with him to battle with the Geats and the Scyldings. He was sunk in gloom, hunched over a mead-horn. I brought him fresh drink and took my place by his elbow. He looked up, then down again, his eyes sliding from mine.
“Tell me of him, Farric.” I spoke straight and bold, willing the truth from him.
Farric shook his head. His face was sunken, his eyes dark; he had given himself to despair, and mumbled low and sullenly.
“You cannot know what you have loosed upon us. We would find more mercy amongst the Geats.”
“It is done, and past weeping. Tell me what I face.” I sought his eye, but he looked shrinking down into his drink. “What lies between this man and my father?”
Farric muttered to himself as he clutched at the horn of mead.
“No man. No man.”
My patience broke. He was always a weak man, Farric. He followed in my father’s train, eating well and drinking his fill, slow to the battle and a bad tongue in counsel. Now I had had enough of his sullen shrinking. I gripped his tunic and pulled him to me, forcing his eyes to mine.
“You will tell me. My people will not suffer for your cowardice.”
He struggled against me, his gaze darting about for escape. At last he met my eyes again, then looked about him pointedly. All through the hall men watched us, hunched over their ale or clustered in tight knots. Their faces were drawn in the morning light, and a deep uneasy murmur rose amongst them. I stood, pulling Farric with me, and walked with him to the guests’ chamber, empty now. I stood with my back against the door and faced him where he cringed in the room’s center.
“Speak. And do not be long about it.”
He sickened me, hunching there in his cowardice and his fawning tones. His reply was a pleading whine.
“It was not me who advised it! I knew we would rue this. I knew we would pay it.”
He stumbled to a halt. I met his eyes unflinching.
“He was the strength of your father’s arm. What deeds were laid to him were done by Harulth.” He saw my look of struck betrayal and hastened on. “The thing was known, but we kept it as best we could. You see how it would look, if it were known abroad – that the king himself did not fight in battle. You see how it would be taken!”
A sickness sank into my stomach. My father’s house was built on lies. All the tales of his might in battle, the strength of his arm and the reach of his spear – there was no truth in them.
“A king is a leader of men,” Farric said, wheedling now, pleading for favor. “He led well. He chose well. He chose his warrior, and worked his kingship through him.”
“Harulth. He chose Harulth.”
“No one knows where he found him. No man knew what he was. But he followed your father like a hound to its master, and no enemy could face him and live.” Farric moaned and wrung his hands together, his eyes widening with fear as he continued. “I warned him. I told him it was unwise. Unwise to put his trust in one man; unwise to spurn him once he had! But he was caught in the net of his making. Once beholden, he had no escape.”
“Why did he seek one? Why put Harulth from him?” But in my heart I half-guessed, and Farric only stared at me in horror .
“You can ask this? You who have seen what he is?” His voice shook. “He is nothing human. The bloodlust masters him, and the very rocks and trees are rent in his passing. No man of us could bide by him in battle; his fury burns the earth itself. He still knew friend from foe when he last walked among us, but look what he has become. He cannot judge even man from beast in his bloodrage. What king could give his name to that? What throne can be built on a monster’s slaughter?”
A sick loathing came over me for the thing that had been done, the calculated betrayal. Whatever Harulth was or would be, I was ashamed, that day, to be my father’s daughter.
“And yet my father took what he wanted,” I said, hearing the bitterness in my own voice, a faint echo of Harulth’s cry. “He set Harulth to the ruin of his enemies, built up this hall and its defenders – and then cast him out when the battle was done and the borders manned without him.”
Farric stared at me, amazed that I could defend him. His eyes were wide and his manner trembling.
“But … you see what he is! You see what he leaves in his wake!”
“I see that my father took that when it suited him, and left Harulth despised and abandoned when he had built his kingdom on his back.”
Farric shook his head. He came closer, shaking with wild fear and a shrinking boldness.
“You are blind still. Fool and girl!” He groaned in his frustration. “Do you think this rage comes only of a warrior cast out by his king? Do you think a man bound as champion alone would lie twenty years upon the marsh, biting his heart in hatred and envy? Do you think that is all that kept Harulth there?”
His voice dropped to a low, trembling vitality. “Think well upon this night past. Think what brought him from the fury of his wrath, slaked his bloodthirst and drew the heat of battle from him. Think what took the force of his rage. He was no different, Aelwyn, when last he walked among us. He craved no different thing when the battle was over.” He looked hard into my eyes, and now I could not meet his. He turned and put his hand to the door, muttering his last words.
“Now think who gave it to him.”
He left, shutting the door behind him. I caught at it for support as I slid down to the floor, hunching in upon myself.
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