Warriors of Ethandun (18 page)

He was beginning to lose it as he ran to meet the two howling men. He was beginning to find that calm place within himself which was full of blood. He had to hope that whatever magic resided in him in this world would reveal itself, because he could not see that his own madness would be much use against theirs.

The shift happened; he was himself and then suddenly
he was a killer. There was no wild rage, only a curious calm and a strange joy. This was what he was born to do.

The first of the men hurled himself towards him, yowling and hissing like a thing possessed. Braveheart answered with a snarl and ran in to attack; the man batted him out of the way as if he were nothing. The giant dog, all muscle, sinew and vicious teeth, was flung through the air like a toy. He had done some damage first, tearing a chunk from the man's thigh. Blood seeped from the wound; the man did not appear to notice. He seemed impervious to pain. His eyes, under the stinking wolf's head, were bloodshot and crazed. Dan's sword stabbed at the man's naked chest but a great, brutish arm deflected the blade and two vast hands closed on Dan as if to strangle him or rend him limb from limb. Dan snarled.

It was not a noise that had ever issued from his throat before, but it felt right. The man was big but slow and Dan had plenty of time to bite down on the brawny arm as if he had jaws like Braveheart and the teeth of a predator. He felt the man's flesh tear, tasted hot blood and then headbutted the man out of his way. It was easy. Suddenly the man's strength no longer seemed so awesome; he was only a man. Dan did not know what he was – there was no time to evaluate, only to act – but with some part of his mind he did allow himself to wonder if he was still only a man, or even if he were a man at all.

Bright Killer lay on the ground a long arm's reach away, but he did not pick it up to finish off the berserker. He did not think it necessary. His own bare hands would be enough. Dan threw himself at the man, who still howled a
war cry, thin and high and tinged with hysteria. Dan's body was a thing of enormous strength. He swiped at the man's naked chest with razor-sharp nails, raking it and making it bleed, as if his hands held knives as sharp and as steely as Bright Killer's blade. The man kept fighting back, though his torso was soaked in blood, though his resistance was weakening. Dan tired of the struggle and finished him quickly, snapping his neck with a violent twist of his massive paws.

The second man was approaching. Braveheart was whimpering somewhere out of his line of vision. Dan could smell death and fear. His balance was a bit off but he coped. He felt heavy and powerful. He dropped into something between a crouch and a crawl. The second berserker was screaming and foaming at the mouth. Dan pounced like some wild animal and killed this one with his teeth. It took a lot of self-control to make himself stop, even after the man was dead. The taste of blood and flesh was not repellent to him.

He got to his feet to take on the rest, the armed men – the men in helms and mail shirts – but they were running away, back towards the trees. Dan turned around to check on Braveheart, but the warhound was cowering from Dan, shivering and growling as though Dan himself had metamorphosed into an enemy. ‘Easy boy,' he said, but the words came out more like some kind of animal grumble: there was something wrong with his mouth. He did not let that worry him as there was still killing to be done. He smelled the enemy and heard them trampling in panic through the undergrowth; they would not escape.
Distantly he was aware that people were screaming. Had he missed an enemy? Someone was calling his name. He turned again to see a man he recognised standing by the warhound, stroking his head so that the dog's shivering was beginning to abate. Dan did not like other people comforting his dog and Braveheart was unquestionably his. He snarled reflexively and made to drive the man away, but the man raised a hand and suddenly Dan felt unbelievably sleepy, so sleepy that he had to lie down. Taliesin. The man's name was Taliesin. He was an enemy too, Dan thought, as sleep claimed him and he was lost to the world.

Dan woke to find Braveheart licking his face and a familiar voice patiently explaining why everything was fine.

‘No, he is not a devil but one of God's own creatures. There is nothing to fear. Look, he is quite restored.'

Dan opened his eyes and closed them again rapidly. All he could see was Braveheart's open mouth and the grey sky heavy with imminent rain. He had a horrible taste in his own mouth and his limbs felt numb; he tried to clench his fist but it took too much effort. He took stock. He was alive and so was Braveheart. Taliesin lived, though Dan did not think that had been in doubt. It seemed that the thegn and his family still lived too. There had been a miracle of some sort and they had survived the onslaught of the Danes.

‘Dan?' Taliesin must have seen the flicker of his eyelids. ‘Dan, are you all right?'

Dan felt so strange that Taliesin's question proved difficult to answer. Taliesin's face appeared looking down at him – all creases, bags and tangled beard. His
penetrating blue eyes were fearful.

‘Yes. I feel strange. What happened? Have the Danes gone?'

A second figure, Aethelnoth, appeared and the two men helped Dan to his feet. He felt as unsteady as a toddler taking his first steps and had to clutch on to Taliesin's arm for support. It started to rain and he shivered with cold. For reasons that he now could not remember, he had removed most of his clothes. He was caked in quite a lot of dried blood. He was fairly sure that it was not his.

Taliesin led him to the farmhouse and Dan found it hard to avoid stumbling, as if his limbs were no longer his own, as if he'd been stretched on a rack. He ached all over. It struck him suddenly that Taliesin must be Aelfred's scop. When they got to the threshold, Taliesin called out a warning over the chatter of voices and helped him to the bench nearest the fire pit. The wife, whose life Dan thought he must have saved, crossed herself. That irritated him. That was the thing about being a killer: people depended on you doing what they hated and then they hated you for doing it.

The room seemed crowded – full of frightened children and the farmhands who had preceded him back to the house were now gathered round the hissing wood fire. The room reeked of smoke and sweat and the all-pervading scent of fear. He licked his lips. He was very thirsty, his throat sore as if he'd been shouting. Silence had fallen. Dan did not need to be an empath to know that he was very obviously not welcome.

‘Fetch him a drink,' Taliesin demanded, and a boy
produced a clay beaker of water. All eyes were on Dan. Dan gulped the water swiftly, but it barely slaked his thirst. He nodded his thanks to the boy who'd given it to him, the boy who'd been ready to fight with the slingshot.

‘How did you do it?' the boy asked boldly, swallowing down his terror. There was a communal intake of breath as all present listened for Dan's reply.

Dan realised that he'd probably killed a few Danes – if he hadn't done then these good people wouldn't all still be alive to stare at him as if he were some monster. Had he done something cruel or terrible to the enemy? He could not remember.

‘How did I do what?' he answered evenly. He had better get the truth over with as soon as possible. Whatever it was he would have to live with it, add it to his already overburdened conscience.

The boy laughed nervously as though Dan had attempted to make a weak joke, which he might have done had he known what the boy was talking about. The boy explained: ‘I mean how did you turn into a bear?'

There was a moment where Dan's mouth moved but no words came out. He remembered the taste of blood, the pliancy of flesh in his mouth, and ran from the house, stumbling on his unsteady legs. He knew it was true.

He was sick of course – who would not be? Then Taliesin was there beside him with more water and he rinsed his mouth out. It did not take away the taste, the metallic tang of blood. He could do little about his tears but wipe them roughly away. A warrior did not cry; a shape-shifter did not wail like a little child.

‘Why?' Dan asked, more petulantly than he would have wanted, shamed to be showing so much weakness in front of Taliesin, who was not exactly his friend, who had tricked him into coming to this place.

‘Need,' Taliesin said with a shrug. ‘You called on the magic and you are the Bear Sark and a bear is what you became.'

‘I killed with my teeth! I tasted flesh!' Taliesin's hand was on Dan's shoulder and he shrugged it away. ‘Everyone is terrified of me now.'

‘They think it is the work of the devil. If you were a Dane, it would be seen as Odin's work and a blessing, but not among the Aenglisc. If it is any help, I saw it all and I do not think you would have had any chance against them if you had fought as yourself – even lost in madness you would have been no match for those men. I am sorry this happened, Dan.'

‘I don't believe you. You should not have brought me here,' Dan fired back, his anger growing. He felt it rise in him, a great tide of fury bubbling up and spilling out. Everything was Taliesin's fault. The very smell of him repulsed Dan. He could have torn him limb from limb. He wanted to tear him limb from limb. He could easily imagine how that would feel and he thought that it would feel very good. Taliesin was skinny, a tall man with little muscle to hold his bones in place. He seemed small to Dan, aware of his own muscular bulk, the huge force that lay under his skin. It would not take much strength to pull Taliesin apart like a doll, to crush his bones like dry sticks …

‘Hush! Calm down – it is happening again.' Taliesin's voice was soothing, like a father to a child – and Dan was no child. Taliesin was always pushing him, manipulating him, getting him to act the way he wanted. Dan was fed up of it. He thrust away Taliesin's comforting arm with a hand grown heavy and immobile.

‘Look at yourself!' Taliesin commanded with the power of enchantment in his voice. ‘Look!'

Dan had no choice. Taliesin still had magic and under its compulsion Dan looked and saw his own forearm grown huge, knotted and bent out of shape. He saw his own deformed hand, as large as a man's head, rigid and darkened by fur, and with the claws of a bear. He screamed and his throat produced an inhuman sound which chilled even his own blood.

‘You have to stop, Dan,' Taliesin said softly. ‘My old friend Brother Frontalis would say that your soul is in danger and I fear that he would be right. You are losing your humanity. You have found a lust for blood that you never had before and the magic of this world is working on that, giving it physical form. You cannot lose control any more, Dan. Do you understand?'

Dan nodded; his head felt huge and fuzzy and it was hard to marshal his thoughts.

‘You have to let me touch you. I can help, but you have to let me get close.'

Dan nodded again. He did not want to let the skinny human touch him though. He did not like his smell. Dan tried to make himself breathe slowly; he concentrated on that. His breath came out in bestial grunts, but he tried
not to worry. He must not swipe at Taliesin with his great paw that could have knocked the man out with little more than a casual backhand slap. Dan managed to keep himself under control, he tried to remember his times tables, anything to override his instinct. He held himself rigid, growing hot with the effort of staying still. He allowed Taliesin to get close enough to touch his shoulder. Dan shuddered and something in him eased; the fury that he had held tight within him relaxed. It was magic, of course, and he mistrusted it, but he was not in a position to turn down help.

Taliesin stayed with his hand on Dan's shoulder for some time. Dan felt his anger die down, felt the exhaustion of the aftermath of strong emotion.

‘Thank you,' he said at last in his own human voice that only sounded a little strange as he fought with his own complicated feelings and the tears he could not quite keep from shedding. ‘What am I going to do? You said those people needed me to fight for them. I was trying to do the right thing. It isn't easy, you know, to run up to madmen knowing that they are going to hurt you. It isn't easy to fight when at any minute you know that it could be you with the sword in the belly, the spear through the spine. I have risked all that and now I am punished. I am a monster.'

Taliesin didn't say anything. A quick glance in his direction showed Dan that he was asleep – tired out from the effort of bringing Dan back to himself. Dan found himself smiling. It was typical of Taliesin to dodge the hard questions. He got to his feet. How ironic that he should end
up being the bear when it was Ursula who was known as the Lady Ursa, the bear on the hillside, the brave spirit of Arturus's Britain. In all the madness of the previous few hours Dan had not forgotten what he was there for and he wasn't about to forget it now. He went to find his horse. He had kept the farm safe. The people there might not have liked the way he'd done it, but he had kept them safe and now he had Ursula to save.

Dan led his horse back to the yard to get Taliesin. Perhaps he ought to have realised earlier that Aelfred's scop, the man they had been trying to meet, would be Macsen's bard, Taliesin. It was obvious when he came to think about it and, on the plus side, Taliesin could play the harp better than anyone else Dan knew, so they were unlikely to be killed for their lack of musical prowess. It was always good to reduce the number of reasons your enemies might have for killing you.

Dan called out to Aethelnoth and to Braveheart to alert them that they should move on. He went alone to wash in the stream: cold but necessary ablutions. Things were not going the way he'd hoped. The magic of this world was not working on him in helpful ways. All he wanted was to find Ursula; it did not seem fair that such a simple desire was proving so difficult to satisfy. A sudden noise made him turn. He whipped round to face whatever the world should throw at him next.