‘Fuck all good it did me!’ I cut in with a bitter laugh. I scratched and looked at my fingernails. The light in here wasn’t good, and I couldn’t tell if there was blood on them or just dirt. ‘And even if it were needed again, this isn’t Constantinople. And that was an age ago and half the world away.’
‘It was eight years ago, My Lord,’ he prompted. ‘Even then, the world believed you were half as old as time itself.’
I looked hard into the bearded face. Joseph had turned up in Jarrow six months before. I’d soon worked out he had military experience. But if it was nice to have someone around who knew Greek, I hadn’t so far got this much out of him.
‘Well, well, my dear Joseph,’ I said. The heat was turning uncomfortable, and I got unsteadily to my feet. My stick was on the far side of the chair, and I couldn’t be bothered to stretch over for it. I walked a few feet down the long table and paused beside one of the less unprepossessing novices. He stared up at me, seeming as scared of the syllables of an unknown language as of the horrors that lurked beyond the three-inch thickness of the gate. I laughed and turned back to Joseph, who remained sitting – still recalling, perhaps, how I’d made my dramatic gesture from the walls of Constantinople and saved an empire on which even the Church had given up.
‘My dear friend,’ I went on, now in Syriac, ‘you’ve a talent for narrative. But to have seen what you describe, you’d need to have been up there on the sea walls beside me, or on the Asiatic shore in the main Saracen camp. I’d place your accent to Antioch – which, like all of Syria, has been in Saracen hands since before you were born. I’ll agree that it’s rude of one refugee to ask another too much about the past. But since you’ve raised the matter of my last public service to the Empire, I might wonder just how much of your fighting was done in the Imperial Service.’ I sat down. I scratched again. This time, I tried not to look at my fingernails.
‘Perhaps My Lord is right,’ he said, still in Greek, with another of his bows. ‘Perhaps the past is best not revisited.’
I nodded and pushed my empty cup towards him. He muttered something about my years, and I scowled at him. After a momentary hesitation, he poured out the second refill. He’d dropped the matter, and I’d not take it up again. I had little doubt, though, that Joseph had fought for the Saracens before taking holy orders. But where was the shame in that? Syria had been out of our hands so long, it could no longer be considered a shame for Christians to fight for its new rulers – even if it was to spread the Desert Faith. And I really was too old and out of things to care. It was all too far away – thousands of miles from Jarrow. Even with the Emperor’s agents snapping at my heels, it had taken me months to get across the wild desolation that was the fate of what had been the Western Provinces. So what if Joseph had been on the other side in my last stroke of Imperial policy? I was glad to have him here and now. But for him, I’d be all alone with these wretched women – young and old – of the male sex.
‘I’m going to my cell,’ I said, heaving myself to my feet. I sat down again. ‘No. Before I go, I want you to bear in mind the threat I made to Cuthbert. If he goes near that gate again, I look to you to see that he doesn’t undo it. And’ – I dropped my voice, although we were speaking in Greek – ‘I want you to keep an eye on young Edward.’ I noticed the slight questioning look. ‘He’s the pretty one with big hands.’ I paused again. ‘You kicked him out of mathematics for idleness.’ Joseph nodded. I went on: ‘Well, he may not be up to learning any of the languages I can teach. But he’s good enough in whatever it is those savages speak. I’d like you to keep an eye on him as well.
‘Now, it really is time for bed,’ I ended, getting up once more. ‘Do have a jug of that stuff sent in to me. I have work to do that always goes better with a slight lubrication.’ I giggled tipsily again, wondering when I’d last held a pen without some mood-altering substance to ease its passing across whatever surface was available. I might have said something else. But as I went back to the chair to gather up my things, I heard Benedict behind me.
‘Brother Aelric,’ came the shaking voice in Latin, ‘something more is happening out there, and none of us can imagine what it could be.’
Chapter 3
With the fading of day, the rain had ceased, and the unbroken grey of the sky had somehow been replaced by a moon that shone from a sky of pure blackness. There was still a mist out there, but it had contracted itself to a dense whiteness that lingered, in the cold, breezeless night, perhaps nine feet above the ground. Here and there, it was broken by the tops of the rather scrubby trees that grew about the monastery. As far as my eyes could see, it was like looking over a field of ethereal snow. I listened again for the neighing that came from somewhere within that whiteness.
‘If they did come ashore at Yellow Tooth Creek,’ I said, cutting through the quiet babble of prayers, ‘it must have been in one of those little boats they have with a shallow draught. Getting horses across the northern ocean in one of those things doesn’t seem likely to me. Fitting in even the dozen men we’ve seen would be a tight squeeze. It’s fair to say, then, that we have a fresh arrival.’ I fell silent and looked down again over the smooth whiteness that concealed whatever might be happening outside the monastery.
‘Could it be His Majesty?’ one of the older monks quavered. ‘Could it be that God in His infinite mercy has spared us for continued labours in the world?’
‘Could be,’ I said, without turning. ‘You’re all certain you heard a clash of weapons earlier, and then a scream?’
Someone beside me nodded eagerly in the gloom.
‘Well, perhaps Aldfrith has sent over a warning for these people to leave now or face the consequences. Or it might be something else.’ I fell silent and listened. Whatever had happened earlier, it now sounded less like a battle down there than a conference. That didn’t rule out some intervention by the secular authority. Just as likely, though, the northerners had got lucky with their thieving, and there had been a falling-out over the horse.
‘We wait until morning,’ I said firmly to no one in particular. ‘Until we can know what’s happening down there, I don’t see the point of further discussion.’
More to the point, I was in need of a piss. All that drink had gone in and done its job. Now, I could almost feel it trickling into my bladder like water through a rain pipe. I set trembling, frozen hands on the ladder and prepared to heave myself into another descent. After all this clambering up and down, I could feel a nosebleed coming on. As Joseph reached down to make sure my feet were properly on the rungs, I heard the faint braying of ‘ Deus uult! Deus uult ’ – ‘God wills it! God wills it!’ Far below, Cuthbert was back in full cry.
‘The moment of deliverance is at hand!’ I could just make out. ‘As the Lord smote the host of Sennacherib, so has He now smitten the northern devils who dared infest this house of peace. Let us give thanks to God for the preservation of our lives. Let us gather up the rich spoils that lie abandoned beyond these gates, and dedicate them to the Lord…’
‘Brother Cuthbert seems to have much amended his tune,’ Joseph observed drily.
‘Not really,’ I sighed, looking up at his moonlit face. ‘It’s all any excuse to open that fucking gate. Do see to him when you come down. I’d like some peace tonight.’
I nearly trod on Wilfred as I stumbled off the last rungs of the ladder. ‘Why aren’t you asleep?’ I asked. ‘It’s been dark some while.’
The boy stood back from me and bowed. ‘Is it true, Master, that the northerners are preparing to leave?’
I sniffed impatiently, then dabbed at my nose. I opened my mouth to speak, but caught another gust of ‘ Deus uult!’ from the great hall.