The Coming of Dragons: No. 1 (Darkest Age) (9 page)

As the day wore on their path descended until they could see fields and woodland below them. The sun was low by the time they came to a little stream and followed it to a cluster of homes dwarfed by a great oak tree. The village was smaller than Medwel, the houses little more than straw huts. The chieftain’s wife, a thin, mournful-looking woman, was milking her cow when they arrived. She clearly knew Cluaran and
did not look pleased to see him but, as the minstrel had predicted, she cheered up at the sight of the hares and agreed to let the visitors sleep under her husband’s roof. She penned the cow in its byre behind the house and led them inside, telling Cluaran to help her lift the planks off a storage pit in the middle of the floor.

‘Reach in and pull me out the nearest sack,’ she instructed. The minstrel had to lie on the floor and stretch his arm down into the darkness, and Elspeth guessed that whatever supplies were kept there were running low. Eventually Cluaran pulled up a half-full sack and the woman scooped two handfuls of dried beans from it into her cooking-pot, measuring them out with a careful eye.

The chief returned as Elspeth and Edmund were helping to replace the last of the planks over the store hole. He was a lanky, straw-haired man, as thin as his wife, with pale blue eyes the colour of the sky at dawn. Cluaran looked small and shabby beside him, his clothes patched and stained beside the other man’s thick woollen tunic. Yet the chief seemed nervous around the minstrel, and made a point of offering him the best seat near the fire. There were no stools for Elspeth and Edmund, who had to sit on the wooden boards over the store hole. Elspeth didn’t mind being excluded from the circle of conversation; she was too tired to talk, and the hut felt stuffy after their last few nights in the open. Besides, sitting on the rough planks felt oddly comforting, reminding her of her old life on the
Spearwa
.

She was sharing an oatcake with Edmund, letting the buzz of fireside talk wash over her, when Cluaran held up his hand. It was nearly dark by now, and his thin face, lit on one side by the firelight, looked suddenly ominous.

‘Listen,’ he ordered.

Outside, there was a rapid, regular pattering sound. It became more distinct as they listened, and Edmund went pale.

‘Horses,’ he whispered.

Cluaran leaped to his feet. With a curt word to their hosts, he strode over and hauled Edmund upright as Elspeth, alarmed, jumped up too.

‘Stand by the wall,’ he told them, beginning to haul at the planks on which they had been sitting. The chief hurried to help him, and together they lifted three of the heavy boards, revealing a deep, dark space beneath.

‘In there – both of you!’ Cluaran ordered. As Edmund began to protest, he snapped, ‘We’ve no time to argue! You must not be found here.’

The hoof beats were louder now. Elspeth peered into the dark store hole, wondering how deep it was.

‘For gods’ sake, girl, hurry!’ said the village chief.

Behind him, his wife was wringing her hands. ‘What have you brought on us?’ she wailed to Cluaran. ‘They’ll kill us all if we’re harbouring fugitives.’

Too frightened to speak, Elspeth dropped into the blackness. She landed on a pile of hay. Edmund shot down so fast beside her, she wondered if he had been pushed.

Cluaran’s face appeared in the square of light above them. ‘Not a sound,’ he warned. ‘I’ll come for you when they’ve gone.’ There was a scraping noise as he dragged the planks into place, and the light vanished.

Elspeth crouched in the prickly hay, listening to the sounds above them. The woman’s complaints were a high keening; her husband’s voice an indistinct mutter.

Then they heard Cluaran, clear and sharp from just above them. ‘Tell them that Cluaran the minstrel was your only visitor, but he headed south before nightfall. With luck they’ll come after me.’

His tread was so light that they did not hear him go, but the heavy door swung open and then shut.

It was cold in the store hole, and Elspeth drew closer to Edmund. As her eyes grew used to the blackness, she made out crumbling earth walls, chilly hay beneath them with the food sack propped on a higher pile at one side, and above, a single, faint chink of light through the boards. It seemed only moments before the hoof beats stopped outside. Almost at once there was a loud pounding on the door. Elspeth let out a terrified squeak, and felt Edmund’s hand reach for hers in the darkness and clasp it – though whether to comfort her or him, she could not tell.

She heard a harsh query followed by quick, frightened answers, but could make out no words. Then heavy footsteps sounded over their heads. Elspeth strained her ears as the man with the harsh voice came into the house.

‘An old man, Aagard by name. He’s tall, white-haired. Has he been this way?’

‘Aagard the healer?’ The chief sounded genuinely surprised. ‘He lives many leagues away, down on the coast. They say he hardly ever leaves his cave. What would you want with him?’

‘None of your business! Give us some food, and we’ll be off. Maybe this minstrel of yours will know more.’

Elspeth froze as more footsteps banged above them. Who were these men, and why did they want Aagard? And what would happen if they found her and Edmund instead?

At that moment the men seemed more intent on eating than searching. ‘Only milk?’ she heard in tones of disgust. ‘Give us ale, woman!’

Elspeth was cold and cramped, but she dared not stir a muscle in case she made a noise that was heard in the room above. Instead, she kept still and listened to the boards creak under the weight of the visitors. The men above had been cursing their host’s food and boasting of their horses, but now their conversation had taken a new turn. It made her flesh prickle and she felt Edmund tense beside her.

‘Turned the cave upside down, and no sign of him or the sword. All we found was that empty sea chest. His lordship won’t be pleased.’

‘But we searched the coast for three leagues each way,’ said the second voice. ‘Could we have missed him at Medwel?’

‘Where would he have hidden? There’s barely a hut left standing!’ The first man began to laugh. ‘Did you see them run?’

The second man laughed too. Beneath their feet, Elspeth stared in horror at her hand. It was because of her sword that these men had murdered the people of Medwel, and meant to kill Aagard! Elspeth felt Edmund shaking – she did not know if it was with fear or fury.

At last an order was given, and there was scraping and clattering as the men got to their feet. Boots tramped across the boards once more, and – finally – there was the sound of hoofs outside, riding off.

Elspeth was too frightened to move, or suggest to Edmund that they climb out of their hiding place. Instead she sat, clasping his hand in hers, as the hay-scented darkness pressed around them.

Edmund dreamed he was in Gaul.

The
Spearwa
had just docked, and men and women lined the harbour to welcome her. Edmund gazed eagerly along the row of faces and, yes, there was his uncle Aelfred, tall as a tree. It was five years since Edmund had seen him, but there he was waving, with the teasing smile Edmund remembered so well. He had made his fortune, just as he’d vowed; behind him were the six black horses that he’d boasted he would buy, and his velvet cloak was fastened with a silver bird like Edmund’s own, a gift from Heored for Aelfred’s good service to Edmund and his mother during the king’s many absences.

But soon there was something wrong. Aelfred’s smiling face was swallowed up by people crowding forwards. The sky darkened and the harbour vanished behind towering waves, and Edmund was back in the storm, his ears filled with the groan of tortured wood, the shouts of terrified men, and overhead, something huge and dark, waiting for him.

He woke to utter blackness and the sound of quarrelling
voices. For a moment he floundered, lost and blind – then last night flooded back to him: the village of straw huts; the store hole; the men who had sat over his head and laughed about murder. Edmund’s heart pounded and he strained to hear the speakers above his head.

‘I told you we couldn’t trust the half-stolen!’ It was a woman’s voice, the chief’s wife.

What did she mean? Edmund wondered. He hesitated for barely a heartbeat before reaching out to look through her eyes. Daylight spilled through the open door and the chief, red-faced, was arguing back. There was no one else in the room.

Edmund blinked and brought back his sight. He reached for Elspeth and shook her by the shoulder. ‘The horsemen have gone,’ he said. ‘We can get out, come on!’

They clambered stiffly to their feet, but the boards were too high to reach. They began to yell. ‘Hello! Let us out of here!’

Light poured in as the planks were abruptly drawn back. Cluaran looked down on them, his face tight with anger.

‘Cluaran!’ Edmund was astonished. ‘But you weren’t –’ He stopped – in three words, he had almost given himself away. ‘I didn’t hear you up there,’ he corrected himself.

‘And if one of those men had stayed here, you’d be in chains now.’ The minstrel’s voice was very cold. ‘You were crowing louder than the village cockerel. I may be able to shield you from your enemy’s eyes, but not from your own stupidity.’

He leaned over the edge of the hole to pull them up.
Edmund, his face flaming, took the minstrel’s hand and let himself be hoisted into the room. Next Cluaran hauled up Elspeth. Their hosts watched nervously, standing very close together as if they were as scared of the minstrel and his travelling companions as they had been of the horsemen last night.

‘We’ll be on our way,’ Cluaran told them.

The chief could hardly conceal his relief. ‘Gods speed you on your journey,’ he muttered, barely looking at Cluaran, while his wife, sour-faced, said nothing at all.

Cluaran walked them hard all morning – turning north, Edmund noticed, and only speaking to point out some hazard on the path. He did not even stop to eat at midday, but pulled a loaf from his pack and handed them chunks as they trudged on.

Edmund deliberately lagged behind to talk to Elspeth. ‘You heard what those men were saying last night?’ he murmured. ‘About looking for the sea chest?’

She nodded. ‘It’s all because of this cursed sword,’ she said bitterly. ‘That’s why they’re hunting Aagard. Those poor people in Medwel.’

Edmund’s mind shied away from the thought of the burning village. He could do nothing for those people, not now.

‘Elspeth, if they’re still looking for the sword, does that mean they are looking for us as well?’

‘They didn’t mention either of us. They can’t know I have the sword.’

‘Not yet,’ he agreed. ‘But Orgrim doesn’t need soldiers to track people down. Once he knows you have the sword, he’ll be able to send his men straight to us.’

‘Do you think he can use his power on me, then? Even though you couldn’t?’

‘No.’ Edmund spoke carefully. ‘I think the sword protects you in some way, as Aagard suggested. But that doesn’t stop you being in danger!’

‘What do you mean?’ Elspeth’s voice was tense.

Edmund did not answer at once.
Orgrim knows me now,
he thought.
He could find me easily if he wanted to
. Were Ripente drawn to each other, somehow? He wished he had asked Aagard more when he had the chance, instead of being determined to know nothing about this unlooked-for gift!

All his life his father had been away on some campaign or other. Edmund’s mother, Branwen, had mostly raised him alone, teaching him the management of a household and the behaviour fitting to a young prince. Branwen’s brother, Aelfred, had been there for a time, and given Edmund his first lessons in swordsmanship and other courtly skills that his uncle hadn’t thought him too young to learn. Edmund had been flattered to have the attention. He had few other true friends and, older though he was, Aelfred always seemed to know exactly how Edmund felt. Nightmares were soothed with magical tales; worries teased out. But then Aelfred too had gone away, to buy six black horses in Gaul, leaving Edmund to learn his duties from his mother once more,
in readiness for the time when he would rule his father’s kingdom.

Edmund’s blood ran cold. Could a Ripente become a king? Or would he have to keep this skill secret from everyone, to protect his inheritance? More importantly, what danger was he bringing home with him?

He looked up to find Elspeth watching him. ‘Orgrim could still reach you through me,’ he told her. ‘I don’t know if I can push him away another time. You would be safer without me.’

Elspeth shook her head. ‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘We should stay together. I know he’s looking for me – well, for the sword. But splitting up won’t keep either of us safe. And who knows, perhaps this enchantment will wear off. The sword will find another hand when it sees how useless mine is for wielding it!’ She gave him a bitter smile, then nodded towards Cluaran’s rapidly disappearing back. ‘Besides, we have to stay together or risk losing the use of our tongues. After all, who else do we have to talk to?’

Cluaran slowed his pace as the sun started to curve down towards the horizon. The land around them was greener now, touched with early signs of spring, and when their path led them into woodland the minstrel stopped and waited for them to catch him up.

‘Where are you taking us?’ Edmund asked. ‘Lord Gilbert said you were headed east, to Wareham.’

‘I’ve changed my plans since then,’ said Cluaran. ‘We’re going north to Glastening. I have business there.’

‘There’s a church in Glastening, isn’t there?’ Elspeth said. ‘My father told me once.’ She trailed off, her eyes darkening with pain.

They were walking through oak and beech trees, their branches still in bud, alongside a small stream. Cluaran seemed to have lost his earlier ill-humour; he was humming under his breath, as if their surroundings had cheered his spirits.

He led them through a gap in the trees and stopped. ‘We’ve made good time,’ he said. ‘We will rest here awhile.’

Edmund looked past him and gasped. In front of them was a lake, not large but perfectly still. The water was a pure, clear green. The trees came down to the water in a horseshoe shape, trailing their branches on the shiny surface, sliced through with shafts of pale sunlight. A few early dragonflies flitted over the surface, but there was no other movement.