Hild: A Novel (58 page)

She turned to Coifi. Poor Coifi. A lifetime in one throw.

She held out her hand. “I’ll help you.”

Hild nodded for Oeric to hold Coifi’s spear—he’d trip over it, otherwise—and put his right hand on the withers of the king’s third-best stallion. She took his left hand, put it on her shoulder and bent to make a stirrup. He put his foot in it and she heaved and threw him into the saddle. She gave him the reins, made sure he had them in hand, then nodded for Oeric to give him the spear. She turned the horse’s head to face the enclosure.

“There’s no hurry,” she said. “Start at a walk.”

But Coifi, in a panic, kicked harder than he meant, and within a breath was thundering full gallop at the entry posts. Hild gripped her seax and braced herself.

Five spear lengths from the opening, Coifi gave a thin screech and flung the spear into the enclosure.

The stallion, trained to within an inch of its life, knew that a thrown spear meant he should swerve away from the expected reply, and he did.

Priest and horse moved smoothly to the left and the spear, the edged iron, flew into the god’s heart.

Every armed man, even the king, flinched. Hild closed her eyes but there was no flash of light, no last thunderbolt.

The grey stallion came thundering back, white-eyed, Coifi clinging to the saddle horn.

It was the scop who recovered his wits first. “Behold!” he shouted. “Woden is crushed. Christ is God!”

It was a victory cry the gesiths understood. They banged spears on shields and cheered. Hild let go of her seax and flexed her hand to get the blood moving again.

Edwin laughed and clapped the bishop on the back. “Now we persuade Eorpwald to Christ. Then we’ll see who the bishop of Rome calls king of the isle!” Lintlaf brought him his horse.

When the king was mounted, Hild saw Lintlaf fish up something hanging from the string around his neck and toss it aside. She stared at it. God in the nettles.

“Lady.” Oeric, with Cygnet. Horses were wheeling, galloping away.

“Take her back to the vill.”

“Lady?”

“I’ll walk. A god needs a farewell from somebody. I’ll be there for supper.”

When she was alone, she stepped between the entry posts. The spear lay at an angle across the beaten-earth walkway. She picked it up and propped it against the tall wall boards.

The enclosure smelt of weathered wood and soil being moved aside by growing things. The paint, so vivid a year ago, was faded. Many of the thick black outlines were still clear but the bright colours were turning to wood and mud. She walked the spiral corridor, running her hand along the painted horizon—sea, beach, dunes, woods, moors—the journey of her people from over the sea. The story of the Anglisc, woven with Woden back to the dawn of their songs.

Ships. Fire. Bright swords. Kin and kine. Woods and wold. Hearth and home. Where was Christ in this? Christ didn’t fight. Christ didn’t farm.

The totem was taller than she remembered. She walked around the base. Waves, cliffs, a ship’s prow, cut sharp and deep and clear. Cut from wood, not cold stone.

Christ was a carpenter. Why did his priests build with stone?

She followed the rising line of the carving. A cliff, a tall pole with a boar banner flying. Flying banner blending with a tracery of oak branches. Birds flying with acorns in their beaks. Up and up. Windblown leaves. Wild geese. Clouds. Mare’s tails. The horses of the wild hunt. Manes and tails becoming the beard, the beard leading to the chin. Up and up. The mouth. Eyes, gigantic but knowable. The eyes of a god who laughed, who lusted, who drank, who threw knucklebones and lost his temper. Up and up. The helmet crested with the boar. Totem and token of the Yffings. And all would warp and wear and weather into the earth as though it had never been.

She stood alone at the empty heart of a gone god, staff in the crook of her arm, one hand on her seax and the other on her cross. She would not wear and weather. She was Yffing. She would be totem and token for her people, the light of the world.

*   *   *

The next day, Goodmanham still seethed with the controlled chaos of the arrival of the king’s party. Late in the morning Hild left Begu and Gwladus to organise their things and sought out her mother. She wanted to talk about the mad Rhianmelldt, to bring Rheged into Northumbria so that their land would stretch from the North Sea to the Irish Sea, and so that Begu could be happy.

Breguswith stood with Æthelburh in the middle of the flax fields, pointing. The queen was shaking her head, gesturing vaguely south.

Hild hesitated. It was best to approach royalty with answers, not questions. But then the queen saw her and waved, and it was too late. Hild waved back and walked towards them.

The flax came to her hip, as high as it would get, though the seed balls were still small and green. Little tunnelled paths ran through the crop. Voles. If her mother and the queen hadn’t scared them away, there would be a hawk or two soaring over the field.

They greeted her with smiles. “Perhaps you’ll give us your opinion,” the queen said.

Her mother said, “We’re of two minds. Risk or reward one way, steady surety the other.”

Æthelburh cut a stalk of flax with her belt knife and rolled the stem back and forth between her palms. She offered it to Hild.

Hild bent and sniffed. “The fibre’s ripe. But the seed isn’t.” They nodded. That much was obvious. “So. Oil or linen?”

“Trading for oil is expensive,” Breguswith said.

“But so is good linen,” said the queen. “And if we harvest now, we’ll have softer, finer yarn.”

“The sun came early this year,” Hild said. She closed her eyes, imagined herself as a hawk, high above the field. Imagined the field just south of here, the one next to that, and the next and the next, south all the way to the narrow sea. Summer was always earlier in the south. She opened her eyes. “The Kentish and East Anglisc flax harvest will be an abundance of oil, and a scarcity of fine linen.”

The two older women smiled at each other. “Linen, then,” the queen said. “We’ll break the news to Coelfrith. He’ll argue.”

“But the king will take your side,” Breguswith said comfortably, and they both laughed in that womanly way that Hild didn’t understand but that reminded her of the new Begu. They turned to go.

“Help me,” she blurted. They both looked back, surprised. She plunged on. “Rhianmelldt of Rheged needs a husband.”

“Rhianmelldt? But she’s young,” Æthelburh said, frowning. “Isn’t she?”

Breguswith nodded, watching Hild. “But Begu isn’t.”

“Begu wants to marry Uinniau,” Hild said. “He can’t marry until Rheged’s settled. Rheged won’t be settled until Rhianmelldt marries a strong man. We want, my uncle wants, that man to be our ally.”

“We need to find this strong man, one of ours, and offer him to Rhoedd for his daughter?”

“There’d be no hurry, but for Begu,” Breguswith said.

Æthelburh smiled. “I have just the man.”

Hild and Breguswith looked at her blankly.

Æthelburh looked pleased. “He’s young. He’s handsome. He’s brave: He has a ringed sword. He’s respected by Britons and Anglisc alike.” She laughed, delighted with herself. “Oh, oh, he fits like a fist in a glove! He’s a Christian, baptised by soon-to-be Archbishop Paulinus. You haven’t guessed? He saved the king’s life.” Now she looked exasperated. “He’s my godson. Boldcloak himself!”

“Cian?” Hild said, bewildered. Cian?

“They say he’s the son of Ceredig king, yet he saved the Anglisc overking’s life and is sworn to him. He’s perfect!”

*   *   *

In the sheepfold, Hild held the fat white ewe against her while Breguswith rubbed the fleece at its flank between her fingers, ran her palm over its shoulder, nodded to herself, then felt its front legs, neck, and belly. She frowned and tried its back legs, tugging enough for the ewe to bleat. She shook her head. Hild set the struggling ewe back on its feet and let it go. “The breech wool is worse than I thought. But the back and flank is thick. Thick and soft and good enough for a king.”

“What are we going to do about Cian?”

“The front wool might not be fine enough for the Franks, but it will do well enough for the Frisians. Now let’s try one of the brownlings.”

Hild caught one of the little grey-brown ewes and hauled it up and back until it balanced on its hind hooves and its eyes rolled in panic. She pulled back a little more until it gave up and let go, and its slotted eyes went blank.

Her mother knelt and began running her hands over its neck. “You should have talked to me first,” she said.

“Yes. But—”

“It’s not like you.”

“No. But—”

“This is very soft,” Breguswith said, “very fine. But delicate. We’ll have to try different bleaches.” She stood up. Hild let the ewe go. “Why did you speak before thinking?”

“It’s—”

“This isn’t the first time, is it?”

Hild looked at her feet.

“I need to know. But bring me that yearling first.”

And so while her mother ran her hands over the bleating lamb, Hild stared at the tight black hairs at the tufts of its ears and tried to tell her mother of the restlessness that rose like the tide, the formless longings, the dreams, the sleeplessness, the strange distance of the world, the urge to play with danger, to touch something she couldn’t reach. “It’s like … like climbing a great ash tree, higher and higher, and the boughs are bending, and I’m reaching, reaching for something, and part of me knows the bough will break, but I don’t care. I want it. I just don’t know what it is.”

“And now Cian might end up in Rheged.”

“Yes. We—”

“But not today. Today we need to sort you. You’re a danger to yourself and others.” She looked up. “Have you started touching yourself?”

Like Begu, under the covers.

“Next time you feel … restless, try it. It will help you sleep. But that won’t work for long. You need a person to anchor you. Someone whose smell and touch will keep your feet on the ground, stop you from climbing until you fall, or from running off a cliff.” She stood up.

“A person?”

Breguswith wiped her hands. “Someone no one will notice. Someone no one will believe.”

The yearling bleated and struggled.

“You can let him go now.” Hild did. He trotted over to a ewe and butted her anxiously on the flank. The ewe ignored him. Breguswith held her apron out for Hild to wipe her hands. “People can always tell who you’ve chosen, but if it’s someone they can dismiss, they won’t dismiss you. Do you understand?”

“No.”

“If they’re not your equal, if they don’t matter, you will be seen to be you, still.” She looked at Hild and sighed. Hild felt stupid. “Look around you. Pay attention to people. Like Lintlaf with your bodywoman and now Wilnoð’s. Or Cian with that red-handed dairymaid at Bebbanburg—no one thought anything of it. But if he took up with one of the queen’s women, everyone would gossip because it matters. Like it mattered to the people of the bay about Mulstan and Onnen.”

“She’s wealh.”

“Don’t be dense. She was the seer’s companion, cousin of Ceredig king. Just as Cian is rumoured to be his son. Your bodywoman, now, she’s no one important. Do you see?”

Hild felt as anxious and bewildered as the yearling.

“Also, make sure they’re clean. Shall I find someone for you? No? Well, don’t get yourself with child. Do everything but that. You know what I mean. If not, talk to your bodywoman. The king will have no use for a swollen seer, and you’ll be more interested in your belly than anything else in the world. Oh, yes, even you. So anything but that. And don’t attract the attention of priests. Why Christ or his priests should care what we do with each other, I don’t know. But they like to meddle. So be careful. And should you slip, come to me immediately. Just remember, no one who matters.”

“You chose Osric,” Hild said.

“Osric was a mistake.”

They listened to the sheep tearing grass. “What was he like?”

Her mother sighed, then smiled a slow, regretful, entirely human smile that made Hild like her. “When no one was watching? Biddable.”

Biddable. She could see how that might be good. But what would she bid her person to do, exactly? She had seen people, in hall, in the byre. She had watched from the trees and through cracks in the wall. But not up close, not properly, just movement, blank eyes, flushed faces. She’d seen animals.

“Help me with this gate.” They opened the fold, shooed the sheep out. They watched them flow like woolly clouds over the grass. “One thing. Whatever you do, make sure it’s not your gemæcce: When these things go wrong, and they always do, you’ll need her to be on your side, the one constant. And you’ll need to find someone for her, now Uinniau’s gone. I’d suggest you buy her a slave. In Kent you can buy gelded ones.”

Hild stared.

“No? Perhaps not. Filthy Frankish custom. But she’s the seer’s gemæcce. She matters because of that. Because of you.” She put a hand on Hild’s shoulder. “Be careful.”

Careful. Always being watched, always spied on. “I’m so tired of being careful.”

“We all get tired of being careful.” She cupped Hild’s cheek. Her hand was soft with sheep grease. “But it will never change. It will never stop.” She dropped her hand. “I’m sorry for it.”

A breeze lifted the corner of her veil. Hild wanted to smooth it for her, but her mother hated to be fussed over. “Don’t you ever want to … just walk away?” She waved her hand at the elms on the crest of the hill and the rolling wolds beyond.

“I could have,” Breguswith said. “When your father died. I didn’t matter. But your sister mattered, matters still, though it’s out of my hands now. And you mattered—and will until this king is dead and gone, and his successor after him, and even the one after that. You can never walk away. They’ll always find you. You matter for your blood. And your mind.”

“Which you made.”

“To keep you safe.”

Your mother has built you a place where you can speak your word openly.

“So be careful, child. Delay finding a person until you must—because once you’ve shared yourself with another, touching yourself isn’t enough. But find someone for your gemæcce soon.”