Wolfbane (Historical Fiction Action Adventure Book, set in Dark Age post Roman Britain) (63 page)

He turned to the others, weary but triumphant. ‘Look, we’re through it. I told you I’d get you to the other side.’

They heeled their ponies to where the trees stopped. The land before them seemed to be coarse pastureland—the sound of sheep in the distance giving credence to this. The undulating nature of the landscape before them restricted their view, but it was clear they had come to a definite end of the forest and not just some clearing in the trees.

Wilburh, who rode beside Raedwald, suddenly grabbed his shoulder and pointed to a faint track that ran through the pasture. Beyond the track, rising from the horizon, a languid curl of grey smoke spiraled into the thin January air.

Bradan’s morning, as ever, had been tough and uncompromising after labouring to grub up two deeply-rooted shrubs from his new field. Come the spring, he hoped the field would be ready to plant with barley.

Three years earlier, many of his fellow villagers had expressed their concerns when Bradan had stated his wish to live independentl
y
on the very edge of Arthur’s protectorate.

Still living with his peers in the village, he had spent every moment of his spare time travelling to and repairing a hut on an abandoned homestead six miles from the village. Here, he had laboured to clear the overgrown field that lay fallow nearby. In his second year, he had sewn his first trial crop and waited. The small harvest had been a success, and Braden guessed it would have been enough to feed his small family throughout the winter had he been resident at the homestead. Now he was confident he and his family could survive alone. His trial run over, the following year he moved permanently to the homestead with his wife and girl, along with his three sheep and two pigs.

Seren, Braden’s wife, sat outside the hut and watched the pot of Barley and roots as it bubbled over the cooking fire.

‘The sheep have done a damn good job of cropping the grass,’ said Braden as he approached Seren. On his shoulders, sat Cara, his infant daughter. He lifted her down and sat beside Seren. She handed him a wooden bowl and spoon.

A frown creased Seren’s smooth face as she ladled a measure of broth into Braden’s bowl. ‘You work too hard; you’re going to be worn down to a greasy spot before this winter’s out.’

Braden lifted his daughter upon his knee. He smiled at her as he guided a spoonful of his broth towards her open mouth. ‘I
have
to work hard so that this little lady has a full belly.’

Cara dutifully opened her mouth to accept the broth. Braden took a spoonful himself and looked at his wife as she continued to stir the pot. As far as he was concerned, she was still the pretty girl he had married. A little older and slightly more careworn,
maybe
, but still, she was radiant and precious to him.

He was about to tell her to stop stirring and start eating when the grunt of a pony had him look towards the fields.

Fifty paces away, a group of five ragged youths sat on five miserable ponies. The ponies had started to feed on the rough pasture beneath them and seemed to have no intent to move any further. One by one, the five youths dismounted.

When two of them took short swords from their belts, Braden bundled Cara to his wife. His instruction to her was rapid and urgent. ‘Go into the hut and stay there until I’ve dealt with this.’ Seren wavered as she looked anxiously from Braden to the youths. ‘Please girl, get inside the hut,’ repeated Braden as his gaze flickered to the adze at his feet, thankful now he had retained the tool when returning from the fields. Seren turned towards the hut, but still she hesitated. ‘Get inside, now!’ hissed Braden as the two youths with swords, who had been involved in a heated conversation with their three companions, began to saunter towards him.

Wilburh had been the first to see the small group feeding beside the hut. Raedwald had soon joined him and inwardly rejoiced when seeing the family. He turned to look back at Baldward, Dudda and Eldstan who had spent the last two miles grumbling and bouncing uncomfortably upon their ponies.

‘There, I told you we would find folk if we continued through the forest,’ he said. ‘And these look like British folk not Saxon. So, you see, we’ve come into land that hasn’t been raided.’

Eldstan seemed less than happy now that things were ready to happen. ‘What do you propose to do now, then,’ he asked Raedwald.

‘Take the child of course; we’ll get a fortune for her in Norwic.’

‘What about the father?’ asked Eldstan. ‘He’s ready to fight by the look of it.’

‘Then we’ll have to deal with him.’

‘W-what, tie him up and put him in the hut like you said?’

Raedwald shot Wilburh a
now’s as good a time as any to tell them
look. ‘No, we don’t tie him up,’ he said. ‘Not now he’s armed himself with the adze. We need to kill him, it’s the only way.’

Eldstan held up his palms in rejection and backed away as if confronted by his most feared nemesis. ‘No ... you didn’t say anything back in Camulodunum about killing anybody. “
We find a homestead, steal a child and return to Norwic
,” you told us.’ He turned to Baldward and Dudda for support, their nods conveying to Raedwald,
Yes, he’s right … that’s what you said.

‘So you think that raiding parties come out here, then find slaves, then maybe shout harsh words at them to get them to hand over their children ... Oh, come on!’ Exasperated, Raedwald looked to Wilburh, then cast a quick glance back towards the hut. ‘Look—we need to get this done. The woman has gone inside with the girl, and the man needs to be taken care of.’

But now it was obvious to Raedwald, as he looked at Eldstan, Baldward and Dudda (who had grouped together in a mutual huddle of rejection) that they would never kill. He pointed back towards the forest. ‘RIGHT!’ he exploded. ‘Get yourselves back into that forest and die there, because only a gibbet awaits you in Camulodunum!’

The three shrank away from the heat of Raedwald’s outburst. Dudda was the one who eventually summoned the courage to respond to him. ‘I for one
will
leave for the forest; I no longer want to be any part of this. I’ll take my chances in Camulodunum, maybe even go to Norwic.’

Raedwald could tell that all three were of the same mind. He raged at them. ‘Away with you and go then!’ Yearning to slay them but not having the time, he turned to Wilburh and saw that he too was hesitant. ‘And you ... get your sword out ... what’s
wrong
with you, man?’

Wilburh darted a nervous look towards the Briton who was standing his ground in front of the hut. Slowly, he took up his sword.

The others had turned away and led their ponies into the forest, unwilling even to witness the oncoming fight.

Raedwald’s onrushing lunge at Braden was immediate and clumsy and the homesteader was easily able to avoid the seax strike. In terms of reach, Braden’s adze had the advantage over the short swords of Raedwald and Wilburh, but his first hack with it missed Raedwald.

Wilburh, who had hung back, now saw Braden wrong-footed. His slash at him was even more inexpert than Raedwald’s but somehow his seax hit the mark, splitting Braden’s scalp from ear to crown.

The Briton staggered and brought his hand to his head as his vision began to blur. He removed the hand and saw it smeared in his own blood.

‘With me, finish him!’ Raedwald screamed his instruction to Wilburh as he sensed Braden’s incapacity. This time, Raedwald’s heavy, horizontal swipe ripped Braden’s bicep to the bone, causing him to drop the adze. Again, Wilburh seized upon the opportunity to lunge at Braden unopposed. Ham-fistedly, he thrust the point of his sword into Braden’s stomach.

As soon as Braden fell, Raedwald and Wilburh were upon him as their bloodlust erupted. Braden rolled onto his back using his arms as a fleshy shield as they slashed and stabbed at him, but soon he sprawled dead and torn, his arms shredded.

Panting and splattered in Braden’s blood, the Saxons finally stopped stabbing at him—exhaustion, rather than an abatement of savagery, causing them to end their assault. Raedwald looked to the hut.

Seren emerged with Cara in her arms. A desperate scream came from her when she saw what they had done to Braden. She took a hesitant step towards his corpse but realised it would take her closer to the killers. Thinking of Seren and possible escape she looked towards the distant tree line, but wavering and aghast, she remained unmoving.

Raedwald wiped his sword on the grass at his feet then moved towards Cara. ‘Help me here,’ he said. ‘Grab the sprat while I deal with the woman.’

‘No—no! Get away from her!’ Seren’s scream rang hollow and awful as she stepped back into the hut. She was prepared to scratch and bite like a vixen to protect Cara, but the pommel of Wilburh’s seax, delivered with force upon her forehead, ended her fight before it could begin. Wilburh grabbed Cara as Seren dropped to the reed-strewn floor of the hut.

‘Take the child outside,’ said Raedwald. ‘I’ll deal with the woman and make sure she doesn’t hinder us.’

Wilburh, throbbing with battle-fever, his earlier reluctance a distant memory, read Raedwald’s intent. ‘Yes, I’ll hold the brat but don’t kill the woman until I’ve had my go with her,’ he said.

Seren’s eyes rolled as Raedwald dragged her to the back of the hut and tore at her dress.
Another one not quite with it
, he thought as he pulled his hose down to his knees.

Flint was one hour south of Corinium on his way back to Brythonfort. The town, like many others, had gone into decline after the withdrawal of Rome. However, an industrious local man had utilised the cleared area of the old amphitheater and erected a huge timber building upon the grounds there. Here, his pottery business thrived, supplying much of the local area with their needs. Such was the renown of his products that many Britons now journeyed miles to obtain them.

Flint and eight knights travelled beside a covered wagon packed with wares as it headed back to Brythonfort. Their presence beside the wagon had been of dual purpose: to ensure the wagon was untroubled by robbers, as well as checking out the country beyond the northern limits of Arthur’s protectorate.

A curl of smoke coming from beyond a low hillock to the right of the track alerted Flint to a possible habitation—the first he had come across for several miles. He looked to Emrys, a young knight of promise who was on his first patrol for Arthur. ‘Think we should take a look, Em?’ he asked. ‘Get a flavour of what’s been happening in these parts?’

‘Well, that’s what we’re here to do,’ replied Emrys. ‘Just me and you on this one is it?’

‘Yes, no need to take the rest of the men.’ Flint wheeled his horse around to face the others. ‘Stay with the wagon,’ he instructed. ‘I’m taking Em with me to chew the fat with some locals.’

The wagon creaked to a halt and the men dismounted, glad to have a rest from the saddle.

Flint and Emrys rode at a trot on the rutted track that led to the homestead. Emrys was the first to get sight of the dwelling as he rounded the knoll, his abrupt stop immediately alerting his companion.

Flint looked at a ragged man holding a hysterical child. His glance,
there’s something not right here!
was not lost on Emrys.

Flint, tense and ready to act, feared the worst as he jabbed his horse forward. ‘What’s upset the child and what’s your name, fellow?’ he asked.

The man, whose expression had changed from elation to despair upon seeing the knights, attempted to mumble a reply as he placed the child to the ground.

‘SAXON!’ shouted Flint upon hearing the Germanic tongue. ‘See to him, Emrys, I’ll take the trail and follow the pony tracks, they may have taken slaves away.’

Inside the hut, Raedwald’s blood turned from fire to ice upon hearing the cry. He rolled off Seren and arranged his disheveled clothing as he realised something was amiss. Events were happening outside. A horse rattled by the hut and Wilburh had given off an alarmed cry. He knew he had to get out, knew it was his only chance. They would be in the hut soon and that would be the end of him. He cast a quick glance at Seren who still moaned in her concussion. She could not be allowed to talk to the Britons when her senses returned.

He groped about in the dim light of the hut feeling for his seax. He found it and slicked the blade across Seren’s throat—her moans becoming a gurgle as her blood drained into the rush matting beneath her.

He looked at the door, knowing the Britons for now were preoccupied. But the door was not an option ... outside the door death lurked. He turned towards the back wall of the hut and jabbed the point of his sword into the wattle frame. The willow split and he tugged at it until he could see a layer of daubed and cracked mud; a thin barrier between him and the outside. He punched out and the mud collapsed to leave a shoulder-width hole. Raedwald dragged himself through the hole and scrambled to his feet.

Ahead, lay a series of low hills. Hearing nothing now from beyond the hut, he ran in a stumbling gait towards the first hill. He crested it, then he half-fell, half-ran, down its slope. Thanking the Gods for his escape, he came to a thin stream and began running along its stony shore, heading for the spinney growing in a curve away from the banking. A steep dell clogged with thick brush, ran along the entire length of the spinney. Exhausted, Raedwald slid into the dell and lay panting beneath the shrubbery.