‘Torment? You are too sensitive. When I first saw you, I thought you a man who liked to play rough and tumble.’
At the clear tease in her voice, Hereward looked at her sharply, trying to guess what game she played. His instinct told him she was trying to keep him off-kilter. He felt sure she was used to making men run like dogs. ‘Leave me be. I have no time for your diversions.’
He was surprised when she did not take offence, and instead slipped her arm through his. She leaned in close to breathe in his ear. ‘Come. There is someone you should meet. And later, more comfort than you will ever find on these frozen banks.’
The promise hung in the icy air for a moment, then Hereward allowed himself to be led back into the filthy streets of Eoferwic. Under the pall of woodsmoke, the people were eagerly anticipating the coming feast and relief from daily toil, if only for a while. Faces were flushed and eyes gleamed. Freshly cut holly twisted round doorways, and sweating men dragged Yule logs across the frozen mud to their hearths. Under twirls of milky-berried mistletoe, men stole kisses from young women as they had done since the days of their most distant ancestors. Over the rooftops rang the squeals of the pigs and the honking of the geese facing slaughter.
‘You are allowed greater freedom than many slaves,’ Hereward said as Acha picked a narrow path into one of the oldest, dirtiest parts of the town.
‘My reward for serving my mistress well.’
‘I have watched you. You are filled with fire, and your tongue is as sharp as a knife, but you bite it whenever the earl or his wife is around.’
‘We all do what we do to survive.’ She skirted a spoil-heap where two hollow-stomached dogs fought over a cow bone, snapping and snarling.
‘But you are not at ease with your lot.’
‘You see that, do you?’ Her eyes flashed.
Hereward saw more than she realized. Her flinty exterior hid a deep, unfocused yearning, much like the one he felt himself. He had never known peace, and Acha, too, was filled with unease, he was sure. The warrior knew that she thought escaping back to her homeland of mountains and forests would still the incessant drone in her head, but he guessed that the source of her troubles lay deeper than that. Perhaps it was the curse of all men and women that no one could see the road that would take them safely through the wilderness.
‘Your king, Gruffyd ap Llywelyn, is raiding England once again. You know King Edward will not allow that to continue. Your people will face a bloody response.’
‘Do not treat me like a girl,’ she snapped. ‘I know many things, and more than you. I know Edward is to discuss the English response at his Christmas court at Gloucester, the court Earl Tostig cannot attend because of the troubles here in Eoferwic. But he will be asked to invade Gwynedd and Powis to drive Gruffyd ap Llywelyn back, there is no doubt of that.’
‘You keep your eyes and ears open in your mistress’s presence, I see. Do you hope that your knowledge of your homeland might be of use to Earl Tostig should such an invasion arise? Perhaps that he might take you back to the Cymri? And then what? An escape? The information you have gathered on the earl would be of great value to your king.’
‘Never. I am loyal to my mistress,’ she replied, the lie apparent.
‘You scheme and plot and twist men and women to your advantage more skilfully than anyone I know. I should watch you,’ he said as they came to a halt outside a small, filthy hovel.
She gave him an enigmatic smile. ‘Then if you are aware of my games, you are protected from them.’
Ducking down, she eased through the doorway. Hereward followed and found himself in a smoky space lit by the glow from the embers in the hearth. Unfamiliar plants smouldered in the fire, filling the air with an odd scent that was at first sickly-sweet but carried bitter undertones. The skulls of birds and small woodland animals hung from the roof in strings that rattled as the warrior pushed his way through them. He felt reminded of the house where the wicce had given them shelter after the escape from Gedley. By the fire sat a grey-haired woman with rheumy eyes, beating out a steady rhythm with a hollow wooden pipe. Her forearms were covered with faded blue-black etchings, and her cheeks too.
‘Britheva, I have brought the one I told you about,’ Acha whispered, crouching next to the elderly woman.
‘He is welcome.’ The woman’s throaty voice held an accent that Hereward didn’t recognize. He squatted on her other side.
‘You are a wise woman,’ he said. ‘I thought the church had driven you out of all the towns.’
‘The tide comes in, the tide goes out. The rocks remain.’ Peering deep into her guest’s face, Britheva held out a hand, snapping her fingers with irritation until Hereward offered his own. The woman grabbed his wrist and flipped it back and forth a few times, examining his skin. She nodded. ‘Feeder of Ravens.’
The warrior flinched inwardly. The familiar vision of the black birds rising up from the lightning-split oak loomed large in his mind.
‘What do you see?’ Acha asked in a deferential whisper.
After a moment’s silence in which there was only the wind whistling in the shadowy roof space and the crackle of the fire, Britheva closed her eyes and let her head fall back. ‘These are the days we feared,’ she croaked.
Acha bowed her head, her black hair falling across her face.
‘From across the whale road they come, on wave-steeds, bringing doom to all,’ the elderly woman continued. ‘Amid the spear-din, the battle-sweat will stain the hillsides. A new breaker of rings will arise, but his rule will be brutal and bloody.’
‘The End-Times,’ Acha breathed, ‘as the Bible foretold.’
‘Starvation. Sickness. Many will die. This land will be blighted. And all the beauty we have made here, and the joy, and the songs, the wisdom of our ancestors, all the great things we have made and the great things we have done, will be washed away as if by the spring floods.’ Britheva fixed an eye on Hereward through the swirl of blue smoke. ‘Are you afraid, Feeder of Ravens?’
‘There are prophecies and portents everywhere these days. If these dark times come, they come.’
‘You are ready.’ The elderly woman chuckled. ‘You have been forged in fire. You know death as a friend, I see that, and not only on the battlefield.’
Hereward flinched inwardly once more; the wise woman struck too close. Unbidden, his mind flashed to his mother’s dead face, her glassy eyes staring into his own, her features barely recognizable. And then to Tidhild, his love, lying in the pool of still-fresh blood, her pebble-eyes staring too, accusing. He had brought death to her hearth; he alone carried the responsibility for her ending. He had always feared he was cursed, and now it seemed this woman recognized it too.
He started to rise, but Britheva grabbed his wrist once more and held him back with surprising strength. ‘Does the truth cause you pain?’ she hissed. ‘There is a reason for all things. The pattern unfolds around us, but we see only the smallest part of it.’
‘And what do you see for him?’ Acha asked.
Britheva peered into Hereward’s face for a long moment. ‘I see him surrounded by fire, a wall of flames.’
‘No prophecy, that,’ he replied with a shrug. ‘It has already happened.’
‘And it will happen again, and again, and again, for fire is your destiny, and blood too. The ravens will always follow you, their friend.’
‘So be it. I have accepted who I am.’
The woman sniggered. ‘You do not know who you are. Not yet. But you will learn. If you live.’
Hereward felt a spurt of anger at the woman’s words. ‘You cannot see inside me,’ he snapped. Britheva only smiled.
‘Is he the one you saw?’ Acha pressed.
‘It is possible. All things are possible. The gods play their games, but sometimes men resist.’
‘And then they are punished?’ the younger woman went on.
‘And then they are punished.’