‘Work hard,’ he ordered in a clear voice, his English only slightly inflected with his Norman tongue, ‘and you will be allowed to return to your farms in good time. You will be given bread and ale once the job is done. Dissent, or laziness, will be dealt with harshly.’ He glanced up at the rotting head of the thegn’s son to illustrate his point. ‘Begin.’ The sword slashed down to his side.
Grudgingly, the peasants plucked up their spades and set to work digging the deep ramparts and replacing the palisade with fresh wood, taller and cut to a point at the top. Soon they would be building a castle here, but for now the hall needed to be fortified, Aldous knew. There had been little resistance in this part of the fens, but it would come.
His legs bound with linen strips in the criss-cross style that signified his high status, the knight urged his horse back under the gateway into the enclosure. He breathed deeply of the aroma of damp leaves and the woodsmoke from the morning’s hearth-fire. Though a long way from his home in Hauteville, there was some peace here now the fighting was over, he decided. But the English were an odd breed, and he wondered if he would ever understand them. Their government and their art, their trade and their financial system, were jealously eyed by all Europe, but the people themselves were an unruly, intemperate lot, given to drunkenness, fighting, coarse humour and moods that swung between raucous high spirits and maudlin introspection. They would not take orders, even if refusal brought them harm. They would do everything in their power to cause delays, distraction and minor irritations, and they seemed to find pleasure in the slightest disruption they engendered. But they would learn, in time. The Normans were the mighty ocean waves pounding any rock-like resistance into meaningless granules of sand.
‘Sire.’
Aldous glanced back to see a young knight striding from the gate.
‘Sire. You have a visitor. The old thegn, Asketil.’
With a sigh, the Norman commander looked to the gateway where a grey wisp of a man rested against a gnarled staff. Aldous removed his helmet and rubbed a hand through his close-cropped hair. His nose was long and sharp, ending at a moustache that curved down to his chin. ‘Is he begging for food again?’
‘He wishes to tell you about a coming rebellion.’
‘Oh?’ Aldous raised his eyebrows. ‘Bring him into the hall. He may find the surroundings familiar and comfortable.’
The two men laughed.
The Norman commander dismounted and marched into the warm hall. Ornately embroidered tapestries hung on the walls and gold plate and bowls glinted in the firelight. He had made no changes to the opulent surroundings since he had become the lord. Indeed, he barely recognized them. Their only value was to mark his power, he thought. With three quick strides, he bounded on to the low dais and took the old wooden chair where Asketil had once sat, and his father before him. Aldous felt only contempt for the old thegn. A weak man, pathetic in his whinings, who still came to bow and scrape before the men who killed his son. Aldous would have attacked the murderers single-handedly with his sword and died with honour in failing.
The grey-haired Englishman shuffled in and stood uneasily in the doorway, looking around his former home.
‘Draw closer, Asketil. Welcome to my home,’ the Norman commander boomed, making no attempt to hide his smirk.
‘I am here to warn you,’ the thegn began, his croaking voice almost lost in the hall’s vault, ‘of a sword raised against you.’
‘And who would dare to challenge me, old man?’
‘His name is Hereward, and he is my son.’
Aldous’s eyes narrowed. He had heard the name before. A great warrior whose fearsome exploits had gained the attention of Baldwin of Flanders. Bear-Killer, the mercenaries had called him when they had joined the invading Norman force, to a man fearing they would face this Hereward on the field of battle in England. Was this the same warrior? If it were, he would need to send word to the court in London. More supplies, more mercenaries. The fens would need special attention.
‘Why would you warn me about your own son?’ the Norman commander asked.
‘Because he is a black-hearted outlaw who has brought shame to his kin.’
It had been the right decision after all to keep the old thegn alive, the commander thought. With the information he supplied, they could set a fine trap to catch the English rebel before even a weapon was raised. Aldous smiled. ‘Tell me more.’
CHAPTER FORTY — EIGHT
Icy black water swilled around Alric’s neck. Panic surged through him. He thrashed his arms to find the narrow causeway, but it was lost in the impenetrable night and the activity only dragged him down further. Kicking his leather shoes in the muddy depths, he fought to stay afloat. The swamp-water sluiced into his mouth, stinking of rotting leaves. He gulped, choked, threw his head back and cried out although he knew there was no one within miles to hear. The weight of his habit dragged him down. Alric passed from the black of the moonless night to a deeper black as the water closed over his head. Silent prayers gave way to sheer terror. Pressure filled his mouth, his nose, his lungs burned, and down he went, and down.
I am a fool, he thought, his last thought.
And then, through the mad whirl in his head, he felt his descent arrested. Water tore at his face and hair as he was dragged rapidly up and out into the chill night. Vomiting swamp-juice, he sucked in a huge gulp of breath. The dark enveloped him. He couldn’t see what was happening, or where he was, but then he became aware of hands grabbing the shoulders of his tunic. Roughly thrown to one side, he crashed on to a hard surface. The flint shards of the causeway ground into his cheek. He lay there for a moment, recovering, and then rolled on to his back. A dark figure loomed over him.
‘You are a fool, monk.’ It was Hereward’s voice, as if he had read Alric’s mind. ‘Why would you try to make your way through the bog with no torch to light your way and no fenlander to guide you?’
‘Because you abandoned me,’ Alric spluttered, realizing how pathetic his response sounded. He let his head fall back and closed his eyes, drinking in the joy of living. He had let his desperation get the better of him, he understood that now. But when Hereward had raced off into the night after leaving his father’s house, the worst had seemed a distinct possibility. Alric had overheard the bitter conversation between the two men and now understood his friend’s inner darkness in a way he could never have grasped before. The pain was still raw. But was it a pain so acute that Hereward would take his own life?
Though he had raced in pursuit, Hereward had outpaced him, and soon he had been left alone on the old straight track. He was filthy, exhausted, and there were no friends to offer him a bed. A cold night passed in fitful sleep under a willow, waking repeatedly, afraid of wolves. By dawn, his bones ached and his stomach growled. He had retraced his steps to the boatwright, but the snowy-haired man only treated him with suspicion, and if he knew where Hereward might have gone he wasn’t saying. And so the monk had spent the day searching and calling. At some point he had wandered off the track and found himself lost in the unforgiving waterlands, surrounded by endless pools and bogs and copses and scattered islands with no landmarks or clear path to find his way back to the village. And then night had fallen, and he had started to believe that Hereward had killed himself. His despair had turned to panic and he had foolishly started to jog, then to run as fast as his weary legs could carry him. Halfway along the narrow causeway, he had wrong-footed himself and pitched into the water.
‘Here is a rule for you,’ Hereward said. Alric could see the silhouette of his friend squatting further along the causeway. ‘No man born outside the fens can find his way across these treacherous bogs and keep his life. This time God watched over you, or I did. Next time you may not be so fortunate. Do not attempt such a risky journey again. Do you understand?’