Blood Eye(13)

Ealhstan mumbled something in his throat that sounded like bastards and plunder and stinking, heathen pigs. And like him I knew there would be more death.





Later, as the Norsemen shared out their spoils, I caught sight of the treasures they kept amidships beneath oiled skins. Much of it was that which they had sold at Abbotsend but taken back after the fight: cream-coloured ivory and reindeer antler, brown furs and chests brimming with brooches, yellow amber, whetstones and silver coin. I saw the necklace Griffin had bought for his wife, too.





'They're rich men, Ealhstan, these heathens,' I said, desperate for the old man to look me in the eye. I was beginning to wonder if his empty, withdrawn stare was due in part to the beating he had taken, and, though it shames me to say it, I hoped it was, because it tore my heart to think he hated me for what I had done. The swelling across his face was yellowing now. 'The ivory alone must be worth a fortune.'





He flicked a wrist and grunted.





'You think they pillaged every last trinket, don't you?' I said. 'From other villages long since burned to black ash.'





Without looking at me, Ealhstan made a fist and stared out to sea, shaking his head. And I knew what he was thinking. Men like these would sail off the lip of the world for a fistful of silver.





'How's your head, old man?' I asked. One of his watery eyes was squeezed almost shut by the swelling. He waved the question away as though to say he'd had worse. 'Old men bruise like apples,' I said as he prodded the swelling gingerly. 'I know, Ealhstan – if you were younger you would have cleaved one or two of these whoresons in two.' I gave him a wry smile. 'Split them like oak.'





He batted the words away with a grimace and I looked out across the waves but saw only the faces of butchered men. I rubbed my chin, touching my swollen lip. It still throbbed with each heartbeat. 'The bow let us down,' I said. 'The string was rotten.'





Ealhstan turned and our eyes locked. Got the luck of the damned, you and me both, they said, and now we're sitting here chewing our own vomit. Then he gave a gap-toothed grin and I glanced at the Norseman who had a piece of one of my arrow shafts still jutting from his shoulder. He rowed as though it was not there, but now and then I caught him grimace with pain. They might be bastard heathens, I thought, but they are proud.





It was early evening when a warning voice called clear and strong from the other ship. It is strange how sound carries across water and a man an arrow-shot away sounds as though he's nearby. Sigurd picked his way to the prow where his shipmaster Olaf stood shielding his eyes against the sun, looking landward. At the top of a great cliff a knot of riders peered out to sea, their spears pointing to the sky. Edgar the reeve must have learned of Abbotsend's fate and sent men to track the heathens along the coast, which they could do well enough on horseback along well-used paths whilst we must make do with a mere breath of a breeze. Sure enough, when we rounded a great chalk bluff, the scouts appeared on the west side and Sigurd cursed. It meant that he would be unable to seek a sheltered bay for the night, let alone more plunder.





Ealhstan sneered at the Norsemen as though he considered them swine with no stomach for a fair fight. Mark me and mark me well, his raised finger said, these shit-filled heathens blow more hot air than a happy cow. He turned his head towards the steersman and tried to spit but there was just a dry popping sound and the Norseman hawked and spat a thick wad over the top strake in response. Ealhstan mumbled another insult, then hunkered down, wrapping his brown cloak around him and rubbing his empty belly.





'I'm hungry, too,' I moaned, scratching my ribs. 'Puked my innards out this morning. Feels like mice gnawing my guts now.' But instead of sympathy I saw blame in the old man's eyes; blame for bringing him a horde of blood-loving heathens instead of a basket full of mackerel. God help your wandering soul, was what his eyes said, and I wished the man still had his tongue so that I did not have to choose the words myself.





As a young man Ealhstan had agreed to be an oath helper to a man accused of theft. The accuser was rich and so one night three men tore out Ealhstan's tongue. Without a man to speak up for him, the accused was found guilty and died in thrall to the rich man. And so Ealhstan was mute, and now his rheumy eyes and my own guilt spoke for him.





Now he closed those eyes and shook his head, murmuring to himself, and when I looked at the stick-thin carpenter with his swollen face and his wispy white hair floating on the breeze I felt ashamed for being afraid when a mute old man could be so defiant.





With the arrival of a stiff northerly wind, Sigurd gave the order to raise the great woollen sail, allowing his men to stow their oars and rest. As the faded red sheet bulged, the Norsemen loosened their shoulders and necks and stretched their aching arms. Some of them took dice from their chests, or wooden figures half carved. Others sharpened blades or curled up to sleep. Two handed out dried salted fish and chunks of cheese, and a few cursed, boasting that they would rather make landfall and light a fire and eat fresh meat, even if it meant fighting the English.