Glendalough Fair (16 page)

[T]he Norwegians were defeated, by a miracle of the Lord, and they were slaughtered.

The Annals of Ulster

They retreated into the trees and the Northmen did not follow. Backed further away, weapons held at the ready, and still the Northmen did not follow. And when at last it was clear the Northmen were not going to follow them into the woods, that they had had enough of fighting, then Louis de Roumois led his men back to where they would meet up with Aileran and the others and make their way back to camp.

A boisterous energy was running through the men. Louis had seen it often enough
,
particularly at the conclusion of a successful action. He figured it was due to some imbalance of the humors, some trace of fear and excitement and madness still flowing in the blood, looking for a means to dissipate. He had felt it himself in the past and he had enjoyed it, but he did not feel it now.

As he pushed his way to the head of the line of retreating men, he grabbed Failend by the arm and pulled her along. She had moved back into the wood with the rest, had tried to make herself inconspicuous, but she was foremost in Louis’s thoughts and he was not likely to forget she was there.

“What in the name of God and all that is holy are you doing here?” he hissed as they walked. “What are you thinking?”

“I was just trying to do my part, to help keep the heathens from sacking Glendalough,” she protested, but her voice was as lacking in conviction as her words.

“
Merde
,” Louis spat. “Are you mad?”

He glanced over at her as he pushed his way through the brush. Her hair was a mass of brown tangles. The bruise Colman had left was mostly gone but now there was a streak of blood on her face. Her leine was torn and the hem was dark with dirt and blood. She still carried her short sword in her hand, and it, too, had blood drying on the blade. There was a weird look in her eyes, one he had not seen before. She did indeed look insane.

“No, I am not mad,” she insisted, despite appearances to the contrary. “Was I supposed to sit there in camp and let my bastard husband glare at me and insult me all day?”

Louis could understand why she would not care to do that, but he was too angry and, he realized, too confused to argue further. They walked on in silence, Louis parting the way through the brush, Failend following, and the rest of the surviving troops, which seemed to Louis to be most of them, making a ragged line behind.

The trees thinned and soon the walking was easier, and then they came out into the open country. The sun had just disappeared behind the mountains, the dark beginning to settle over the river valley, and Louis was happy to be out of the woods.

“This way, Captain,” Lochlánn said, pointing with his sword. He had pushed ahead to catch up with Louis, feeling it his duty, apparently, to remain at his captain’s side. Louis nodded and turned away from the river, Lochlánn on his right, Failend on his left and the rest behind. A few minutes later they came to the rutted and dusty road down which they had marched from their camp that afternoon. Louis called a halt, and most of the men dropped immediately to the ground, some sitting cross-legged, some lying on their backs.

Soon they could hear men coming down the road, a soft sound, much like the wind in the trees, but accented with the jingling of mail and the occasional thump of a weapon or a shield. Aileran’s men. Louis did not think the Northmen would have the will to sally forth from their camp.

“You men, on your feet, form a column,” Louis said in a voice just loud enough to be heard. The men stood reluctantly and fell into line on the road. “No, not that way,” Louis said. “Do you want to march back toward the heathens? The other direction.”

Seventy men turned around, facing in the direction from which they had come many hours before, and behind them Aileran and his men materialized out of the dark. Louis stepped forward and extended a hand. There was still light enough that Louis could see Aileran’s face, weary and strained, but his expression brightened as he saw Louis approach. The older man took Louis’ hand, squeezed it, then pulled Louis toward him and hugged him around the shoulders. Louis could see the other men-at-arms coming closer, smiling as well, thumping his back in approval.

“Well done, sir, well done,” Aileran said, releasing Louis from his grip. Louis stepped back. The others were nodding their agreement. The farmers with the spears might not have appreciated the action to the degree they should, but the men-at-arms understood it had been well planned and had been brought off neatly and well.

Louis nodded. “And you, too. That was a goodly fight. The heathens will not be so bold now, I think. Did you lose many men?”

Aileran shook his head. “Five did not make it out. I pray to God they were killed on the battle field and not left alive. You?”

Louis realized he had not made a count of his men, a gross oversight, but he did not want to admit as much. “We lost only a few. Far fewer than the heathens and Kevin mac Lugaed lost,” he said, confident that he was right about that.

“I don’t think the heathens will follow this night,” Aileran said. “I think they had their fill of us. And I don’t think they much fancy wandering around the countryside in the dark.”

Louis nodded. “I agree. My men are ready to drop from exhaustion. I propose we march a mile or so up the road and find a place to bed down. Set a guard, sleep on our weapons. March back to camp at first light.”

“Yes, that would be best,” Aileran said. “Is that a woman?”

The abrupt change of subject caught Louis by surprise. He turned to look in the direction Aileran was looking, though of course he knew perfectly well to whom he referred.

“Yes,” Louis said, turning back to the captain of the men-at-arms. “That is Failend, wife of
Colman mac Breandan. She followed our column from camp. Had a notion to see a battle, apparently.”

Aileran nodded but said nothing more. He turned and ordered his men to fall in behind Louis’s, and the line of weary armed men headed off. In the moonlight the road looked like an old scar across the grassy country and it was simple enough to follow. Despite the easy going men stumbled here and there as they walked. Lochlánn’s toe caught a small rock and he nearly went down, and Failend kept dropping behind and then taking a few quick steps to catch up again. They had all been pushed to the point of exhaustion and beyond.

Off in the distance, a few hundred feet away, Louis could see where the open country was broken by a stand of trees, a dark towering presence in the night, a good place to which to retreat if an enemy came on them in the dark. He slowed his march and called for a halt, and the column behind him shuffled until they were still.

“We will bed down here for the night,” Louis said. “Captain Aileran and I will post guards. The rest of you make your beds here. Keep your weapons handy, sleep in your mail if you have it. Any who have water, share with those who do not.” He cursed himself for not anticipating this, for not bringing food. “We move again at first light,” he added.

There was no comment, not a word was spoken. The men were too exhausted for that. They stumbled off toward the field and dropped here and there. Some pulled cloaks over themselves; most did not bother. Four minutes after Louis had given the order, the field was strewn with motionless bodies, as if it was his men and not the heathens who had suffered a great loss in battle.

Failend found a spot a bit away from the rest. She sat but she did not lie down. Instead she drew her knees up close to her chest and seemed to stare out into the night.

Aileran appeared out of the dark and he and Louis took a moment to discuss the placement of sentries, then Aileran went off again to see it done. Louis, now bereft of excuses, sighed and shuffled over to Failend and sat beside her.

He had not really spoken to her since Colman had caught them in their act, just a few words when he had the chance. He had managed an apology. She had accepted. She did not seem angry or disgusted with him. Indeed he had the notion that he was more angry and disgusted with himself.

“Have you come to apologize to me again?” she asked. “For humping me and then leaving me to face my husband alone?”

“No,” Louis said. “Should I?”

“No,” Failend said. “I suppose you’ve done enough of that. But I always enjoy it.”

They were quiet for a moment. Louis watched as the unhappy men chosen to stand the first watch were roused from their sleep and pushed off to their posts. “What were you doing today? At the heathens’ camp?” he asked.

“Killing heathens. Like you,” Failend said.

“Your husband let you go? Did he know you were following us?” Louis noticed that neither of them cared to speak Coleman’s name.

“I told him,” Failend said. “I told him I was going to do that, to follow you to the fighting. I don’t know if he believed me. And if he did I don’t think he would be much grieved to see me dead. It would save him a great deal of trouble.”

They were quiet again. Then Louis said, “Aren’t you afraid of being killed? Aren’t you afraid of your husband, or the heathens?”

For a long time Failend did not answer, as if she was genuinely considering the question. Finally she said, “Yes, I’m afraid of those things. But I’m more afraid of being bored.”

That was not at all what Louis had expected, and he did not know how to reply, so he did not. They sat in silence for some time longer and then Louis stood, his muscles protesting the motion. “Good night, Failend,” he said, and staggered off to a place at the fringe of the sleeping men and lay down again, flat on his back. He closed his eyes and felt the warm tide of sleep come over him. Then, as it carried him off, he was jostled, just slightly, just enough to pull him back into the waking world. Someone had laid down beside him. Failend. He realized as much in the same instant as he came awake.

“Failend?” he whispered stupidly. He felt her hands under his cloak, just the pressure of them through his mail shirt. He felt them move over his chest and down along his thighs. He heard her make a soft dove-like sound as she nestled her face into his neck.

Louis recognized what she was feeling: that dissipation of energy, the long, slow settling of the passions raised by battle. It was often manifested in a consuming sexual desire. Louis had seen it many times, had felt it himself. For the whores in the taverns along the River Seine there were few nights as lucrative as those when Louis and his mounted warriors had repelled a raid by the Northmen. But he had never seen that particular phenomenon in a woman because he had never seen a woman take part in a battle.

“Failend, this won’t do,” he said. He rolled onto his side, facing her, and even as he did it he knew he was lost. He could see her face in the moon’s light, her smooth white skin, her over-large eyes, the soft brown hair tumbling around her head. His nose was filled with the scent of her; dried sweat, but not like a man’s sweat, strong and repulsive, but rather carrying on it the smell of the perfumed oils Failend used, and under that the scent of a strong, fearless, bold woman.

She reached up with her hand and stroked the side of his face and he leaned down toward her and kissed her. She put her hand on the back of his head and drew him in and he kissed her with growing passion, his exhaustion left in the wake of this stronger need. He left her lips and ran his mouth over her long neck and up behind her ear, breathing in the smell of her skin and hair the way one breathes in the fresh air of an early morning.

He leaned back again, looked into her eyes. They gleamed in the moonlight and he saw the thrill and desire in them. In his head a voice screamed
Don’t do this! Don’t do this, you damned, damned fool!

Then he heard his own voice speaking, though he seemed to have no control over the words. “Let’s move away from camp, over by the stand of trees,” he whispered. Failend gave a small nod, a hint of a smile. Louis de Roumois cursed himself, cursed his weakness and his utter lack of resolve, but still he stood and snatched up his cloak and took Failend’s hand and walked her over toward the wood. The guards were arrayed to look in the other direction, toward the heathens’ camp, and the rest of the men were in deep sleep. No one saw them move.

Louis spread his cloak down on the grass and Failend laid down on top of it. Louis unbuckled his sword and tossed it aside, then shucked his mail shirt in one smooth, practiced motion and dropped down beside her. Their arms wrapped around one another, their lips pressed hungry together. Failend pulled her brat over her shoulders. They kissed again, their breath coming in short gasps. Louis grabbed the soft, thin linen of Failend’s leine and pulled it over her head and Failend struggled with Louis’s tunic until he helped her to get it off. They pressed against each other, feeling the delicious sensation of skin pressed on skin and the cool night air blowing over them.

They tried to be quiet and were mostly successful, though once Louis had to clap his hand over Failend’s mouth. Still, the distance from the others and the sounds of the night and the dead sleep into which their company had fallen sufficiently covered the gasping, moaning, thrashing noise of their passion. Or so Louis hoped.

When it was over Louis pulled the edge of his cloak over Failend’s body and half over his own and fell into a sleep of near perfection. His slumber was marred only by a vague but persistent nagging that prodded at him, even unconscious as he was, until finally, sometime in the deep hours of morning, long before the sky showed even a hint of light, he woke with a start.