Hild: A Novel (17 page)

“Cian, Onnen’s son, is unhappy. A sword would make him happy. You could give him one.”

Mulstan tipped his head back and studied the sky. The clouds were like puffs of wool, far away. “Cian is wealh.”

Hild said nothing.

“Aye, and so is his mother, for all her Anglisc ways.” He sighed and slid his seax along his belt to a more comfortable position. “He’s young.”

“He has no father.” Silence. Hild ploughed on. “When he was six, Ceredig, king in Elmet, gave him a wooden sword.”

“Ceredig?” He mused upon the implications of that, humming in his throat.

“And he has been gifted by lords of the north with shield and horse.” An exaggeration perhaps, but the pony, Acærn, like Ilfetu, had not left Tinamutha, so Mulstan would never know. “He has had the esteem of royalty. But Ceredig is no longer king in Elmet, and Cian is here. And his mother.”

The smith’s hammer started up again,
ting-ting-ting
. More throaty musings from Mulstan, only this time Hild made out words. “Young ram … wants to charge at things … his mother … who knows what at … Ceredig, eh?” He cleared his throat. “Well. Well. Has the boy had instruction?”

“My mother’s sworn man has shown him a little. He’s travelled with the royal war band. He sleeps in hall with your men and exercises all the time. The sword is his path.”

“You speak like a seer.” He sounded disapproving.

“It is his path.”

He knew the rumours. And she sounded so certain. But he hated this notion of meddling with wyrd.

“Please, lord. He is like a brother to me. I wish to see him happy.”

“No doubt so would his mother. Well!” He slapped his thighs and stood. “I thank you for bringing this to my attention, little maid. I will think on it.”

“Thank you, my lord, for listening. And for Cædmon’s kid, or pig. Thank you on behalf of my uncle.” The king.

*   *   *

Hild sat with Begu in hall to one side of the open door. Midafternoon sun poured into the hall, throwing shadows all one way along the floor. It shone on the carefully cleaned table where they sat, on the flat band of red-and-black tablet weave growing between them, and on the walrus ivory of the eight square tablets, each the size of a child’s palm.

“Keep it taut,” Begu said, for the third time.

Hild kept leaning forward to touch the ivory. The tablets she used at home were polished elm. Her mother’s were antler horn. These looked like something you could eat, like wafers of creamy curd or slices of the meat of some gigantic nut.

Each tablet had a separate warp thread through the holes at its four corners. They were twisted a quarter or half turn after every pass of the weft shuttle, also of ivory, to make the pattern. Hild had seen her mother and Onnen weave a band in one afternoon while one also worked a spindle and distaff and the other threaded the weft shuttle back and forth rapidly, beating in the weft every few passes. But she and Begu were new at this, and they must constantly stop to remind the other of something: turn this tablet a half turn, keep that warp taut, beat in that weft. It was a simple pattern but strong, a march of red and black squares.

Guenmon came by with a cup of meat tea for each. The men had killed two oxen that morning for tomorrow’s feast—Hild had heard the snarling and snapping of the bulldogs as they controlled the cattle for the butcher. The fresh bones were boiled with their tatters of meat in salted water to make a tasty drink thick with marrow. Guenmon had added a pinch of thyme and a hint of precious pepper.

“It smells like a dream,” Begu said.

“Wait til you see the meat itself,” Guenmon said. “Luscious and marbled through with fine white fat. The spring grass always does it. And there are to be three fat-tailed sheep, as well as all those waterfowl Mulstan will be bringing home in his net. Celfled has promised us a stitch of eels and a hind from her woods. And Cædmon’s sister brought us sacks of the freshest greens. But so she should, given that plump little milk goat the lord gave her. And I tasted that batch of mead we made from the run honey. Onnen’s the finest brewster I’ve met. Though I think I might be a better maltster.” She saw that neither girl had an opinion on the matter. “Well, now, that’s a fine bold pattern. For Cian is it?”

“It is.”

“Red and black. So as not to show the dirt and the blood, I expect.” Begu paled and paused. Guenmon tutted to herself. What did the girl think got spattered on such things? “Will it be ready for the feast?”

“I hope so,” Hild said.

Now there was a maid who wouldn’t be surprised by blood. “I’ll leave you busy little gemæcces to it, then.”

She smiled to herself at the sudden shyness that fell on the two girls as she walked away.

Gemæcce, Hild thought, staring at the pattern. She looked up, found Begu looking at her, blushed, looked down again. After a breath or two she looked up.

“Is it good?” Begu asked.

“Yes,” Hild said. “Yes, it’s good.” And she sipped at her tea and scalded her mouth and spat and laughed. “Ow. Be sure to blow on it. At my uncle’s table, no one blows on their food. You will have to learn to clap.”

“You will teach me.”

“Yes. At his table no one waits. The food arrives just right, or the housefolk are punished.” The wealh are punished. And Begu was half wealh—though beyond Mulstanton by the Bay of the Beacon no one would know.

*   *   *

When the housefolk began putting out the fires in hall, Hild went to find Onnen. She walked to the beach, where the grass met sand, past the place where kitchen servants turned their vast spits in their outdoor kitchens while others built a long, long board on the sand for the food, and found her between the two towering piles of wood that would be lit that night—that is, one towering pile, and one fallen mess.

Onnen was shouting at a slave in Anglisc. “Did I not say, throw the faggots on the shadow side of the pile, the shadow side?”

The slave hung his head. He was nearly as old as Mulstan, but thin and knob-kneed and barefoot.

“And where is the shadow? Look at me. Where is the shadow?”

The slave pointed.

“Yes. And why didn’t you throw the wood there, as I told you? Because you’re lazy, witless, and ignorant. And now the whole thing is a disordered heap and must be built again. I should have you whipped.” She saw Hild approaching from the wood path and walked to meet her with a step that was as quick as usual but not light.

“Will you really have him whipped?”

“I might.”

Hild had never seen her threaten a slave with a whipping for such a little thing. “Are you … well?”

Onnen folded her arms. “I could cheerfully strangle you. I feel like a bee in a bottle. Mulstan is plotting something, I can feel it, and it’s something to do with you, with what you said to him. What are you meddling with?”

“Cian needs his sword.”

“Sweet gods! Cian is too young for his sword! Oh, he would get the benighted blade, all in good time, if you simply let things alone. Look, look here.” She tapped the brand-new iron hangers on her belt. “I have the keys. The rest would follow naturally, in time. Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

Hild didn’t know what to say. Love and bed games were one thing, keys another. Onnen might be a cousin of Ceredig king, but Ceredig was dead, and Breguswith, daughter of kings, might not want to let her go.

“My mother—”

“Aye, your mother. Well, I warned her my decisions wouldn’t—” She made an impatient gesture. “I don’t want Cian to be a man just yet. If he must ape his betters, he should at least wait until he’s grown before he goes off to get killed. Think what would have happened at Tinamutha if he’d had a sword.”

Red and black, blood and dirt. Her seax opening the Irishman’s arm, skin and muscle gaping like a flower.

Onnen smoothed her dress and sighed. “I don’t know what possessed you, but it’s done. Tonight stay close. Stay with Cian, stay with me. For once, do as you’re told. Now leave me alone to see to this mess. Unless you want to help?”

*   *   *

At the beach the tide was out, whispering to itself as it ran along the pebbly sand and put a pale frothy line along the deep blue near the horizon. As the sky darkened, people—perhaps two hundred, all Mulstan’s fighting men and kin, the beekeepers and swineherds and milkmaids, the sailors and guests and visitors, sitting in the sandy grass as heedless on this one night as children—began to lean back and loosen their belts and girdles and sashes and pick at the mountains of food of every kind. The beef, marinated all morning in vinegar and imported olive oil, and roasted right there on the beach, the sheep, the hind, the songbirds, the eels, the chard and mallow and goosefoot, the sow thistle and cresses and coleworts, all flavoured with vinegar and dill and sage, savoury and pennyroyal, rosemary and rue.

Hild sucked the juices from her bread trencher and gnawed the soft insides from the crust. She sat a few paces down from Mulstan, who had his arm around Onnen. Cian and Begu had competed to see who could eat the most red carrots in the time it took Hild to drink a cup of sweet elderflower wine, and now both were smeared with herby, vinegary streaks, and as neither had thought to count their carrots they were contemplating another contest. But then Mulstan unwound his arm from Onnen, nodded to his scop to strike a chord—Hild recognised Swefred, Mulstan’s chief sword man, drafted for the purpose—and stood.

It took a while for the quiet to spread down the boards, but eventually all that could be heard was the slish-run-whisper of the surf and a querulous child, soon shushed.

“We stand on the other side of another winter and at the beginning of a summer that all the signs point to as good beyond memory. We live on good land, by a rich sea. Our stock is healthy, our crops thrive, and our children are strong.”

Hearty, if sleepy and well-fed, rumbles of approval all around.

Mulstan gestured to Onnen, who stood. “I have taken to wife this woman, Onnen, of the Elmetsætne, and she will help me husband this land and see the old snug in winter and the young fat in spring.” He twined his hand in Onnen’s and raised it, and again there were rumbles of approval, though not as many; this was old news. “And Onnen has a son.”

Mulstan looked down the board at Cian and gestured for him to stand. Cian scrambled up, wiping his hands down the front of his tunic.

“I welcome Cian as Onnen’s son and my fosterling.” People craned to see Cian; the light was leaking away and the cooking fires were being put out, one by one. Mulstan turned to Swefred, who handed him a long, wrapped bundle. “A thegn’s fosterling should have arms.”

Cian quivered like a horse bitten by flies.

“Cian, fosterling, come receive your arms.”

“Wipe your face,” Begu hissed at him, and when he looked at her, blank as butter, she made a wiping gesture at her cheek. He lifted his hand as though he wasn’t sure it belonged to him.

“This is your path, brother,” Hild said. “It is come. Walk tall.” Then, as he stood there, overwhelmed, she said as her own mother had long ago, “Walk now.”

He did.

And he smiled. He smiled as he tripped over everyone’s feet and knocked over their cups. He smiled as he took the bundle, smiled as he unwrapped the sword, as his mother touched his cheek and Mulstan enveloped him in a bear hug. He smiled wider as the last fires went out and the sea slished. Smiled as he lifted his blade and tried to see it in the sudden rush of dark.

Then the rising moon, which had been flat as a silvered plate, popped as round as a ball of cheese, and it was full night. Mulstan gave a great shout and the crowd echoed him. He knelt by the tiny pile of birch shavings and sheep’s hair, and with his steel struck a spark, and blew, and a tiny curl of flame, like a dragonlet’s tongue, licked at the salty night. The crowd roared. The flame built, and Swefred, arms full now of unlit brands, handed them one at a time to Mulstan, who plunged each into the flame until it caught, then handed the first to Onnen, and the crowd roared, then one to the smith, and they roared, to Celfled, to the tanner, and on. Behind Swefred, Guenmon gave out unlit torches to everyone within reach and they passed them from hand to hand, still dark. Each initial torchbearer began the walk to hearth or hall, hut or smithy, and along the way touched the torches to those as yet unlit, and rekindled the fire for another year.

And then the crowd roared again, and this time didn’t stop, and Cian, holding his own torch now, turned, sword raised, as a ship, pale sail glimmering in the moonlight, drew close to the beach.

Hild reached for a seax that wasn’t there, then found an eating knife with one hand and Begu’s wrist with the other. She began to push her way through the crowd to Cian.
We are us.
They would die together. But then two men in the bows of the ship unfurled a standard, and after a moment’s flapping in the unsteady night breeze, the linen cloth streamed clear. Moonlight gleamed on the gold stitching and a single garnet sewn at the eye: the royal boar. The king was returned.

*   *   *

Hild was explaining to Begu for the third time why she did not need to dismantle her linden-wood bed, that she would not require silverware, that there was no room on the boat for her pony, that, yes, she could and should bring her ivory tablets, when she became aware of Onnen watching from the doorway.

Hild had last seen that expression on her almost-mother’s face in the hall of Ceredig king, when the two strange men had beckoned Cian into the light.

“What are you doing?” Onnen said.

“We’re packing,” said Begu. “And I had no idea it was such a difficult thing. Hild says I won’t need my bed. She says I won’t need any hangings. But I don’t know. What do you think, Onnen?”

“You won’t need to pack your bed.”

“I won’t? Well. If you say so. But—”

“You won’t need to pack a thing. Hild, with me.”

They walked into the sunlight and gusting wind but got only halfway down the steps before Onnen took Hild by the shoulders and brought them both to an awkward halt.

“What have you promised her?”

“I have told Begu she is to come with me.” Hild looked up into Onnen’s eyes. She had to squint against the sun. “We are to be gemæcce.”