Blood Eye(90)

'Lad's not there, Raven, I know that much,' Penda said, his loping run so smooth and natural that he looked like a predator. 'If he's still got breath in him, they'll have him in a bigger shit pit than that place. The boy's not a piece of meat like you and me. He's got a real price.' Just then a coot burst up from the reeds, making a sound like a hammer striking an anvil. 'And we're gonna bleed for it,' I heard Penda mutter.





We ran on in silence, each man aware of the danger we were in, for if Weohstan was being held in a Welsh fortress, how were thirty men going to free him? We mud-smeared few who loped like shadows along the riverbank were both hunters and hunted, perhaps closer to the afterlife than to our own homes. Certainly I was, and the thrill of it filled me, making my heart thump and my limbs tingle, and though Penda expected us to die with Welsh spears in our bellies, I believed the Norns had woven another fate for me.





The Wessexmen waited in the darkness on their haunches, catching their breath and looking out in all directions. Oswyn tilted his helmet, splashing water across the prisoner's face as he lay in the mud. When that had no effect, Oswyn kicked him in the balls, which seemed to work for the Welshman groaned and his eyes rolled as he came round. Oswyn kicked him again, hard, and the man cried out.





'Where's the Wessexman who was taken across the wall?' I asked, holding up a hand to stay Oswyn's raised foot. 'Your people took a prisoner when the moon was lying down. Where is he now?' The man winced, holding his swollen face, then shouted and struggled and we had to hold him down and cover his mouth. Oswyn repeated my questions in the man's own language, but the Welshman spat and threw back his head, revealing the naked whiteness of his throat.





'He wants you to kill him,' Oswyn said, spitting in the man's face.





'He thinks we killed his wife, Penda,' I said with a grimace. 'He'll tell us nothing.'





'Shows what you know, whelp,' he growled at me. 'This piece of goat shit will tell us the last time he took a dump by the time I'm finished.' He removed his helmet and ran a hand through his short hair, raising it into spikes. 'He just needs a little persuasion.' Crouching, he drew his long knife and held the blade against the man's groin. The Welshman grimaced in defiance, his teeth white in the darkness. 'Keep him still,' Penda barked, cutting through the man's woollen breeches. The Welshman began struggling now. 'Hold him still if you want to keep your bloody fingers!' Penda hissed at Oswyn. Despite his bulk, Oswyn was struggling to keep the Welshman's legs on the ground. Then the man's prick was exposed and Penda grabbed it, putting the knife beneath it. The prisoner began babbling in his own tongue as a thin trickle of blood ran down Penda's blade. Penda raised an eyebrow at Oswyn who was grinning like a child, for it appeared that the Welshman wanted to help us after all.





'He says he heard of a raid into Mercia, but no men from his village were involved,' Oswyn translated. 'His village is war poor,' he said, sharing a look with fat Eafa, 'and its menfolk have no stomach for fighting the English.' The man prattled on wide awake and cooperative, though I doubted it would help him now. 'He does not know where they took the lad,' Oswyn said, looking at Penda. Penda shrugged his shoulders and bent back to his task, holding the blade against the man's shrinking penis. The Welshman yelped and Penda shook his head slowly, withdrawing the knife. The man looked pleadingly at Oswyn who dipped his head, encouraging him to speak for his own sake. 'He says if they took anyone important, any lucky bastards too valuable for the slave market, they would take them to Caer Dyffryn,' Oswyn said. 'It's a small fortress in a valley north of here.' Some of the Wessexmen murmured and cursed at the name.





'I know it,' Penda said. 'A lot of us do.'





'He swears he doesn't know more,' Oswyn said.





Penda scratched at the scar beneath his chin. Then he wrapped the Welshman's hair around his fist, yanked his head back and sawed through the gristle of his throat. The man's breath escaped with a soft gush.





'Óðin's teeth, Penda! He could have told us more!' I said, watching the Welshman die, his eyes bulging in panic. 'We could have asked how many men are at Caer Dyffryn. How long it will take to get there . . . anything!'





Penda wiped his knife on the man's tunic and stood. 'If we'd asked more, he would have begun lying to us, lad. Would have come up with a sack full of horseshit to dishearten us.' He gestured to the Wessexmen, who stood peering into the dark as though they expected arrows and spears to rain down on them at any moment. 'The lads don't need lies, Raven. It's bad enough as it is.' I stared at the Welshman, at the black blood bubbling through the tear in his throat. His body convulsed and his legs twitched pathetically. Then he was still.