Arnulf’s oxen were halted by the ferocity of the storm. They stood patiently, their tawny hides soaked to a dullish brown, their hooves gradually sinking into the mud. Osric and I crouched in the shelter of the cart, the water rising around our feet. Arnulf pulled up the hood of his cloak and hunched in the lee of his beasts. For perhaps an hour the storm beat down on us, and then eased to a steady, soaking rain. We began to move. The oxen sloshed through the mud, and the wheels of the cart left deep grooves that instantly brimmed with rainwater. I imagined I could hear the eels thrashing and roiling excitedly in their tank.
Heads down, we plodded on, scarcely noticing that we were finally leaving the forest. The rain continued all that day and the next night, a miserable time spent under the wagon once again. At dawn on the second day it was still raining heavily as we took to the road once more. There were no other travellers, and when I finally looked up and took an interest in our surroundings, I saw that we were approaching the outskirts of a large, sprawling township.
Arnulf pointed. A mile ahead of us the ground sloped upward. There, surrounded by a web of scaffold, were by far the largest buildings I have ever seen. Still under construction, they already dominated the town.
‘Big Carl’s newest palace,’ Arnulf said, wiping the rain from his face. His wet birthmark glistened like sliced beetroot.
He led the way deeper into the town. The citizens were all indoors, shutters closed against the sheeting rain. Stray mongrels and pigs scavenged in the miry side lanes and flooded ditches. The closer we came to the new palace the more substantial were the houses. I assumed they belonged to wealthy merchants and members of the royal entourage. Occasionally a servant or a slave on some errand darted between the houses, dodging the spouts of water gushing from the roofs and gutters. Drenched, we slogged on until we had entered on the royal precinct. It was a vast building site. Materials lay everywhere: heaps of timber; piles of cut stone; stack upon stack of bricks. Here at last was some activity. Under long, low shelters and out of the rain carpenters were shaping huge beams with saw and adze. Men heated and hammered metal in a dozen smithies, stonemasons carved and split, and smoke oozed from an odd-shaped building which, to judge by the great heap of clay beside it, was a brick kiln. We passed a makeshift roof under which a team of men was walking round and round a circular pit, pushing on a heavy beam. Glancing into the pit I saw that paddles attached to the beam were mixing a sludge of what looked like grey-brown porridge and realized they were mixing vast quantities of mortar.
As we trudged past them, the function of several different, half-finished structures became apparent. A massive rectangular building had the same proportions as my father’s mead hall. I guessed it would become some sort of grand meeting chamber. Beyond it a large octagonal building was taking shape and was well advanced. The arched framing of its roof was in place and formed the skeleton of a great dome I guessed was destined to be a royal church. I also made out the foundations and lower walls for what would be a long arcade. It was not just the size and scale of the structures that amazed me: I had never seen bricks used in this way. At home we built our walls with wood and clay and capped them with thatched or tile roofs that had to be replaced regularly. Here the monumental walls were being put together with thousands upon thousands of sturdy rust-coloured bricks with an occasional course of cut stone. Any observer would know that the buildings were intended to endure forever.
Arnulf guided his two oxen through the churned-up mud towards a cluster of older buildings. Shortly before reaching them, he halted his beasts.
‘This is where our roads part,’ he said in his usual blunt manner. ‘I report to the seneschal’s office,’ he paused briefly. ‘And thank you for your help on the journey. I doubt we will meet again.’
He walked away to stand beside his oxen, clicked his tongue and the wagon creaked off through the mire. I was sorry to lose his company for he had proved to be an honest man, and had been patient in allowing Osric and myself to use him as our teacher so that we could learn to speak the Frankish tongue. Quite a few of its words were similar to my Saxon speech, and Osric and I had practised together so that we already had a good working knowledge and were improving daily. My last glimpse of Arnulf was the tip of his wand waving above the eel tank, more like a fishing rod than ever.
Osric and I were left standing alone in the rain, and I took the chance to switch my eye patch from one eye to the other. I had discovered that if I left the same eye covered for too long, I had difficulty in seeing with it afterwards.
The nearest shelter was the porch of the part-finished octagonal building I had noted earlier. I ran across and removed my sodden cloak, trying to avoid dripping water on a couple of priests already loitering there.
‘Could you tell me where I might find the office of the court chamberlain?’ I asked.
The taller of the priests, a gaunt man in his fifties with a freckled complexion and a high forehead, gave me a sharp look.
‘Where are you from, young man?’ he asked in a precise, deliberate voice that matched his scholarly appearance.
I explained how King Offa had despatched me to the Frankish court.
‘I thought I recognized the accent, though your Latin is more than adequate. I see you’ve brought your weather with you.’ The priest drew his gown more tightly around him and peered up at the leaden sky. ‘It looks as if this rain’s set in for the rest of the day.’
‘I’m hoping to report my arrival to the chamberlain’s office,’ I reminded him.
He grimaced.
‘You’ll find the government at a standstill. The rain has kept everyone away, and the floods. The fords are impassable and the current in the river runs too strongly for the ferries.’
I wondered whether I should turn round and try to catch up with Arnulf. He should have reached the royal kitchens by now, and at least there would be hot food there.
Osric limped across to join us. He looked woebegone, splatters of yellow mud on his tunic. He seemed to have shrivelled.
‘You’ve done well to get this far,’ observed the priest, eyeing us, ‘one with difficulty seeing, the other walking.’ He seemed to make up his mind about something. ‘If you will follow me. .’
He set out across the sea of mud towards a substantial two-storey house, one of a handful of newly completed buildings. It stood alongside the great half-finished meeting hall, and two sentries armed with heavy eight-foot long spears guarded the entrance. They seemed to know our guide for they saluted him, banging the hafts of their spears on the ground which sent a spray of rain dripping from the rims of their iron helmets. He led us inside, and then up a staircase. The place had the atmosphere of a private residence rather than any office. Two more guards were stationed each side of a large double door where he knocked. A voice called to us to enter and we stepped into a spacious, plainly furnished room. In the centre was a broad table on which stood a clay model of the palace as it would look when completed. Nearby were a number of low stools and a tall upright wooden chair which reminded me of my father’s high seat in the mead hall. On the walls were a few rather faded hangings depicting hunting scenes. The only colourful item in the room was a large cross, exquisitely carved and gilded and placed at one end of the room on a low plinth.
At the window with his back to us stood a tall, thick-set man gazing moodily at the rain. He had an arm around the shoulders of a young woman.