Wolfbane (Historical Fiction Action Adventure Book, set in Dark Age post Roman Britain) (24 page)

CHAPTER ONE

Weeks earlier, Maewyn had helped his brother, Aiden, out of a scrape yet again. As a slow, clumsy fellow, Mule, as everybody knew Aiden, had predictably upended a flagon of water and drenched the fresh floor rushes laid down by his mother only days before.

‘You sluggard!’ shouted Maewyn. ‘Mother’ll thrash your arse when she returns from her trip. Come on. We need to get more rushes from the marsh. We can undo your clumsiness and save you a scolding from da at the very least.’

Mule looked despairingly at the floor and then at his younger brother. ‘Sorry Wyn … it’s my big feet again. Da says that I’m even clumsier now I’ve grown so big.’

Maewyn merely sighed, then left the hut with Mule following morosely in his wake.

Scudding clouds, pushed along by a sharp breeze, cast fleeting shadows over the settlement. The harvest had been a good one, and Govan shoveled the last of the surplus grain into the bell shaped storage pit at the edge of the village. He looked to his young daughter, Elowen, who knelt beside a pile of wet clay. ‘Now for the part you like,’ he smiled, ‘… the bit where you get mucky.’

Elowen pushed her hands into the clay and slopped it on top of the pit opening. ‘You know I make a good seal for the grain, da,’ she said as a twinkle of mischief came into her eye, ‘and besides, you make a fierce warrior when daubed with the muck.’ With this, she grasped Govan’s cheeks with her muddy palms. After leaving a respectable smear across his face, she ran off squealing with Govan in pursuit.

Govan quickly captured her and lifted her aloft, then returned with her, laughing and wriggling, to the pile of glutinous clay. ‘Not such a clever lady now, are we?’ he said with mock sternness as he dangled her over the clay and allowed her long blonde locks to touch the glop.

Elowen was upside down and helpless with laughter. ‘No da, NO!’ she screamed as Govan continued to dangle her over the pile. A further scream prompted him to set her back down on the ground where he gave her a smeared face to match his own.

They sat beside the pile, laughing as they took in each other’s grimy features. Govan looked fondly at Elowen. ‘If mother still lived she would call us a couple of cuckoos,’ he said.

Elowen smiled, a hint of sadness in her eyes, as she recalled mother who had died of fever two years ago, but before nostalgia could take root, Govan nudged her.

‘Look out … here comes cousin Mule … Wyn too,’ he chuckled. ‘Looks like Mule’s been a daft lad again by the look on Maewyn’s face. Hey Wyn! What’s he been up to this time?’

‘Clumsy bugger again,’ said Maewyn sulkily as Mule looked on sheepishly. ‘Knocked a full jar of water over. Can’t afford to make mother angry, or she’ll stop our trip to see Flint at Brythonfort.’

‘Better get it sorted out then,’ said Govan. ‘If you want to train alongside brother Flint, you need to keep out of scrapes. Elowen will help you, won’t you, lass?’

‘Of course,’ said Elowen as she stood on tiptoe and ruffled Mule’s hair. ‘You great ox,’ she laughed. ‘I’ll go and fill the flagon with fresh water.’

They departed, leaving Govan to cover the clay-plugged storage pit with turf. When he had finished, he walked across to the ditch and palisade that encircled the village. Here, a man stood knee-deep in green water, whistling as he pulled out fistfuls of accumulated vegetation.

‘Get your back in it,’ chided Govan as he jumped with an engulfing splash into the ditch beside his brother. ‘Robert and old Simon from Brythonfort will be less than pleased if they find out we’ve let their defensive ditch get clogged  up again.’

Bran stretched, taking the kink out of his back. ‘Yes that’s for sure, but finding time to do all the jobs around here isn’t easy.’ He pointed towards the tall wooden palisade that encircled the ditch. ‘At least that’s in good order. It should keep anything out. Man or bear.’

‘It’s men
I
worry about,’ said Govan, grunting as he pulled fistfuls of wet greenery from the ditch. ‘We’ve been lucky up to now; lucky that we lie in the west of our isle; lucky that we’re protected somewhat by Brythonfort and its knights, though I wish they had the men to patrol here a bit more often.’ He straightened, frowning, as he looked past the ditch and towards the linear fields that lay beyond the village boundary. ‘Still … I worry, though,’ he continued as he turned his gaze back towards the village, ‘… about our folk; our children; our future.’

‘Mmm,’ pondered Bran. ‘God knows what would happen to my boys, especially Mule, if left abandoned and alone.’ He smiled as his thoughts went to his much-loved, lumbering boy. ‘Which brings me neatly to him. I saw him heading to the reed beds with a cross-looking Wyn after they’d been talking to you. Always looking after him is Wyn; you wouldn’t think him five years younger. So, come on, what’s he been up to this time?’

‘Nothing which can’t be fixed,’ said Govan. ‘I believe it was a bit of an accident involving reed flooring and water. I sent Elowen to fill the—‘

Bran, who had been looking absently towards the fields, gripped Govan’s arm, interrupting him. ‘Get your family together,’ murmured Bran, ‘I’ll get mine. We’re have company.’

Two fields distance away, Irvin, a British tracker and fighting man, had seen all he needed to. Satisfied his search had been fruitful, he wheeled his pony around and prepared to impart his news to Ranulf.

Later, Ranulf could see that Irvin’s demeanor as he approached was indicative of fresh news.

‘Well?’ he asked.

‘A village, still untouched ahead on the trail,’ said Irvin as he hastily dismounted. ‘Looks like a sizeable settlement, so it should provide rich pickings. Two men were clearing a ditch when I got there. They saw me unfortunately.’

Ranulf frowned as he looked up the trail. ‘That’s not so good,’ he said, ‘now they’ll be ready for us. Was the village fortified?’

‘Ditch and palisade.’

Again, not good, thought Ranulf. Not good at all. Especially now they were vulnerable to attack from the nearby British garrison. They were too close to Brythonfort for comfort; too far west for his liking. But what could he do. The market for slaves was stronger than ever; the opportunity for profit greater than ever. The danger was also increasing since the easier work in the east had dried up. But there was absolutely no way around it; accumulating gold meant taking risks these days.

He turned to his men. ‘Prepare flame arrows,’ he shouted, ‘we have a fence to burn down. Capture and bind anyone worth gold between here and the village. That’ll give us an easy start.’

Maewyn and Mule stood in the water at the edge of the wetlands. They had already gathered an impressive pile of rushes, but had become distracted, in the way that boys do, when a water vole had glided close by. Mule had procured a large branch from the foreshore and had parted the reeds with it. Maewyn peered through the resultant breach, looking for the vole.

They turned on hearing a wild splashing from behind. Thirty strides away, a group of riders rode through the shallows toward the settlement. Without thinking, Mule waved his branch in the air in greeting. ‘No!’ said Maewyn as he pulled Mule towards him and knocked the branch out of his hand. ‘They’re not Arthur’s men, you jester, look how they’re dressed. They’re Saxons.’

‘S—Sorry, I didn’t know,’ apologized Mule, ‘I thought—‘

‘You
never
think, you just act like a fool!’ scolded Maewyn. Immediately, he regretted his words when seeing the hurt on Mule’s face. ‘They’ve seen us now. We need to get into the marsh and hide,’ he said less harshly. Mule, mortified by what he’d done, could only stare into the water. Realising that time was slipping away from them, Maewyn grabbed his shirt and ran with him into the reed beds.

Irvin, who was ever vigilant and riding at the front with Ranulf, caught the movement in the corner of his eye. ‘Over there in the marsh … two of them … boys, I think!’

Without checking the stride of his pony, Ranulf shouted behind him. ‘Alfwald! Sigward! Two in the reeds! Tie them up, then get back to me!’

Two raiders peeled away and rode towards the main body of water. Standing in their saddles, they soon spotted the two boys who had begun to run deeper into the reed beds.

Alfwald took the lead—his pony creating a wild splashing as he rushed towards the boys. Mule had fallen on his face in his haste to get away. Sigward, who was soon upon the youth, slipped from his mount and took a hold of him. Meanwhile, Alfwald approached Maewyn who stood with both fists raised in defiance.

The boss on Alfwald’s buckler crashed against Maewyn’s head, knocking him in the water beside Mule. Dazed, he entered a bubbling and muffled underworld, but before he could take a watery breath, a gnarled fist grabbed at his tunic. He emerged from the pond with a whooshing gasp, all of his fight gone.

Sigward panted as he pulled Mule’s hefty bulk to the banking.  Maewyn, for his part, was marched to the water’s edge by Alfwald, while the discarded Saxon ponies stood fetlock-deep and unconcerned as they drank from the marsh.

Alfwald dealt with Maewyn’s resurging feistiness by again knocking him to the ground.

‘Lively sod this,’ he grunted to Sigward as he knelt on the boy and bound his hands together behind his back. ‘Better drag him away from the water’s edge or he’ll wriggle into it and drown. Ranulf will have my bollocks on a spit if that happens.’

‘Glad this big un’s not as lively,’ said Seward. ‘I’m pissing drained just draggin' him from the reeds.’

Next, Alfwald tied Maewyn’s feet. Then he rolled him onto his belly and secured his hands and feet together by a short rope so that they almost touched. Seward repeated the procedure with Mule. The men stood and briefly admired their handiwork as they observed the trussed and immobile boys.

Maewyn shimmied himself next to Mule as the Saxons rode away to rejoin Ranulf. His hair was drenched and his face smeared. He spat out mud, fighting the impulse to gag. ‘A
right
fix we’re in,’ he said, trying not to cry. ‘They must have found our village. Da will be forced to fight now.’

Mule had none of his brother’s resolve and readily bawled. ‘It’s my fault again,’ he sobbed. ‘If I hadn’t waved the branch, we wouldn’t have been spotted … wouldn’t be in this mess.
’
As he sniveled his mucus dripped down and formed spherical globs which sat proud of the dusty floor.

Maewyn’s heart went out to him then. ‘No, we wouldn’t,’ he said. ‘They were coming anyway and we would’ve met them sooner or later. We can only hope da gets the chance to come and look for us.’ Groaning, he attempted to move his arms. ‘Bugger! These ropes are tight. Please let him come soon.’

Hoping to catch sight of his sons, Bran ran around the edge of the stockade in a frenzied dilemma. He knew the boys had gone to the reed beds and would be targets for the approaching war band. Govan had pleaded with him to withdraw behind the protection of the palisade, reasoning there was nothing he could do for them now. Bran’s thoughts whirled. What was he supposed to do? Abandon them?  What would he tell his wife? 
Sorry but I had to save my own skin so I hid behind the palisade.

He ran to the gate where Govan counted in the last of the ploughmen and herdsmen as they returned from the fields. Now, he had made up his mind. ‘Shut the gate, Govan, I can’t leave them out there. I won’t be coming in.’

Govan nodded resignedly, knowing he would do the same if Elowen had ventured beyond the protection of the stockade.
Thank God she was inside the fence
, he thought. He threw Bran a well-used, cast-off sword donated to the village by Flint. Although shabby looking, the sword had been honed to a keen edge, thanks to the attention given to it by the village smith.

Bran tested its balance as he ran down the track, away from the village. It felt right in his grasp, even though he had received only rudimentary training in its use. Arthur had made sure that all the men in his protectorate had received basic weapons instruction, and therefore the capability to defend themselves and offer some resistance to the raiding war bands. Erec, a weapons instructor from Brythonfort, alongside Withred, the Angle and ally, had visited most of the villages and given instruction on the use of ax, spear and sword. The villages possessed some donated hardware, but local smiths had forged most of the weaponry now owned by the communities. Withred had also given a tactical insight in what to expect when faced with the brutality of a Saxon attack.

Bran loosened his shoulder by swinging the sword around his head as he ran. His intention was to find his boys and defend them as best he could. He knew he could not fight a huge force alone, but still intended to protect his sons. To the death if it came to that.

He had not long to wait before he heard the sound of riders. A nearby drainage ditch was his only cover, and he had barely enough time to fling himself into it and lie low as the riders hastily approached then passed him. He could not see his boys and this set him thinking.
Had the bastards killed them? Maybe drowned them in the marshes?
As soon as the riders were a safe distance away, he left the ditch and ran to the reed beds.

Maewyn, who had managed after much wriggling to roll onto his back, cried out his utter relief upon seeing his father approach. Mule, who had been floundering on his belly, became still upon hearing Maewyn’s exclamation. Soon, he felt his binding being severed and was able to roll onto his elbow and look up at his father.