The Scribe (10 page)

Sheathing his knife, he dragged her by the arm to the center of the room. There, Theresa watched in horror as he undid his trousers to reveal a hairy, palpitating member. The young woman stood paralyzed. She could never imagine such a horrible thing could be hiding under a pair of trousers. She was so terrified that her bladder spontaneously emptied itself, making her feel she might die of shame. The two men, however, celebrated her accident with a guffaw. Then the big man held her, while the other tore at her dress.

A grotesque smile spread across the freckled man’s face as Theresa’s stomach was exposed in the glow of the embers. He admired how her pale flesh contrasted with the triangle that crowned the top her legs and felt desire ferociously gnawing at him. He spat on his member, rubbed it, and guided it toward Theresa.

The young woman cried out and struggled furiously. She cursed them over and over and, somehow amidst her thrashing about, managed to free herself, taking the opportunity to run toward the pile of logs. Frantically she groped for the stylus she had in her
bag, thinking she might have a chance if she could find it. But her hands rummaged in the dim light, seemingly in vain.

Just as the freckled one was about to jump on her, Theresa grasped her father’s stylus and held it out in front of her, hands trembling. The skinny man stopped, the implement just a hand’s width from his face.

The big man looked on in astonishment, waiting like a dog for his master’s command, but the freckled one said nothing and merely burst into laughter. Then he picked up a jug and drank until the liquid streamed down his chin over his clothes. Without letting go of the jug, he slapped Theresa with his other hand, making the stylus fly through the air.

Theresa suddenly found herself lying on the clog-covered bench, with the Saxon on top of her drooling over her face. The smell of alcohol filled her nostrils. Fevered from the wine, the Saxon fumbled for his organ, pinning Theresa’s arms down above her head. Theresa tried to close her legs, but the man pulled them violently apart. At that moment she noticed that her assailant’s right hand was resting under the gigantic blade. He was so drunk he hadn’t even realized. If she could just get her arms free for an instant… She lifted her head and kissed the Saxon on the mouth, taking him by surprise.

Theresa took advantage of his confusion. In an instant, she pushed away the support under the guillotine, making it drop down onto the Saxon’s hand with such violence that his fingers flew through the air, blood gushing as they were severed clean off.

Theresa took her chance and ran for the door while the wounded man rolled around like a hog. She would have escaped were it not for the big one, who stood in her path. She tried to sidestep him, but with unexpected speed the man grabbed her by the hair and raised his knife.

Theresa closed her eyes and screamed. Yet, right when she expected to feel the Saxon’s killer blow, he instead let out a strange
groan. His eyes turned white and he began to stagger, falling to his knees right in front of Theresa, before collapsing face-first onto the floor. In the bandit’s back, she saw a large dagger. And behind him, young Hoos Larsson offered her his hand.

Hoos took her safely outside, then went back into the house from where Theresa heard more gut-wrenching screams. Before long he returned, his hands bloody. He went to Theresa and wrapped her in his woolen cloak.

“It’s all over now,” he said awkwardly.

She looked at him with tears in her eyes. Then she realized that she was half-naked and flushed. She covered herself up as best she could, and Hoos helped her.

Hoos Larsson looked more attractive than she remembered. A bit too stout, perhaps, but with an honest face and restrained manner. She had not heard anything about him for some time, though it had not bothered her. She was grateful to him for saving her, even if he would surely now take her to Würzburg to hand her over to the authorities. But she no longer cared. All she wanted was for her father to forgive her.

“We should go in. We’ll freeze out here,” he said.

Theresa looked over to the house and shook her head.

“You have nothing to fear. They’re dead.”

She shook her head again. She would rather die of cold than go back in there.

“By God!” said Hoos gruffly. “Then let’s go to the shed. There’s no fire there, but at least we can get out of the rain.”

Without giving her time to respond, he took the young woman in his arms and carried her to the shed. There he arranged some straw on the ground with his feet and gently laid Theresa down on it.

“I must take care of those bodies,” he told her.

“Please, don’t go.”

“I can’t leave them. The blood will attract the wolves.”

“What will you do with them?”

“Bury them, I suppose.”

“Bury those murderers? You should cast them in the river,” she suggested with a frown.

Hoos burst into laughter. But on seeing the look of reproach on Theresa’s face, he tried to contain himself. “Sorry for laughing, but I don’t think that’s a good idea. The river’s so frozen I’d need a pick first in order to make a hole to throw them through.”

Theresa went quiet with embarrassment. The fact is she knew a fair bit about parchments, but almost naught about anything else.

“And even if the water was flowing,” he added, “throwing them into the river wouldn’t solve the problem. No doubt those men were part of a scouting party, and sooner or later the river might carry the bodies to their companions.”

“There are more Saxons?” she asked in fright.

“Just a small band—but fierce as wild animals. To be honest, I don’t know how they got through, but the passes are infested with them. In fact, I lost three days skirting the mountains to avoid them.”

Skirting the mountains… that could only mean Hoos had come from Fulda, so he wouldn’t know what had happened in Würzburg. She gave a sigh of relief. “Anyway, your arrival was heaven-sent,” she said, watching Hoos clean the blood from his hands by rubbing them on the snow.

“Well, the truth is I’ve been here for a couple of days,” he replied. “Yesterday, I had decided to spend the night in the kiln, but as I approached the site, I noticed light in the house and saw that it was those Saxons. I didn’t want any trouble, so I thought I would sleep in the shed instead and just wait for them to leave. When I awoke this morning they had gone. However, I searched the forest to make sure. After a while, I decided to head back home and that was when I saw that they’d caught you.”

“They must have gone out to hunt. They came in with squirrels.”

“Probably. But tell me… what were you doing in the house?”

Theresa blushed. She hadn’t expected that question.

“I was near the kiln when the storm took me by surprise.” She cleared her throat. “I remembered the house and I went to take shelter there. Then those men came out of nowhere.”

Hoos furrowed his brow. He still could not understand what a young woman was doing alone in these parts.

“What will we do now?” she asked, trying to change the subject.

“I need to start digging. As for you,” he suggested, “you should take care of that bruise on your face.”

Theresa watched Hoos go back into the house. She had not seen him for some time, and though his face had hardened, he still had his curly hair and kind countenance. Hoos was the Larsson widow’s only son to give up the trade of quarryman. She knew this because the woman was constantly boasting about his appointment as
fortior
of King Charlemagne, a position she knew nothing about, except for its strange name. She estimated that Hoos was around thirty years old. At that age a man would normally have fathered a couple of offspring. But she had never heard the Larsson widow mention any grandchildren.

Hoos eventually returned to the shed with the spade he had used to dig up the earth. With a weary gesture he threw it to the ground beside Theresa. “Those men won’t be causing us any more problems,” he said.

“You’re soaked.”

“Yes, the rain’s pouring down out there.”

She screwed up her face but didn’t know what to say.

“Are you hungry?” asked Hoos.

She nodded. She could have happily eaten a whole cow.

“I lost my mount crossing a gorge,” he grumbled. “The horse and my supplies are gone, but in there,” he said, pointing at the house, “I’ve seen a brace of squirrels that could ease our hunger, so you decide. Either we go back in the house, get warm, and fill our bellies, or we stay out here until the cold takes us to our graves.”

Theresa pursed her lips. She did not want to go back into the cabin, but Hoos was right: They would not last much longer in that shed. She stood and followed him to the house, but at the front door she stopped in her tracks as a shiver ran down her spine.

Hoos looked at her out of the corner of his eye. He felt sorry for her but didn’t want her to notice. Kicking open the door, he showed her the empty room. Then he put his arm over her shoulders and they walked in together.

The warmth from the firewood comforted them like a hot broth. Hoos added an armful of logs to the fire, which was spluttering away lighting the room with a soft glow. The fragrance of hot chestnuts filled her lungs and the smell of roasting meat piqued her appetite. Theresa looked at the tidied belongings and blanket near the hearth. For the first time since the fire, she felt safe.

She hadn’t yet fully settled in before Hoos had the squirrels and chestnuts ready. “Those men knew where to look for food,” he said. “Wait a minute.” He went off and soon returned with some clothes. “I took them from the Saxons before burying them. Take a look. There might be something you could use.”

Theresa wolfed down some food before turning her attention to the garments. She examined them closely before choosing a scruffy-looking dark woolen coat, which she used to cover her legs. Hoos chided her for discarding a thicker fur because it had bloodstains on it, but he was pleased that she decided to keep the knife that the big Saxon had tried to stab her with.

When they finished eating, they fell silent for a while, listening to the rat-a-tat of the rain on the wattle roof. Then Hoos went to peer through a crack in the wall. He guessed that it would be night soon, though a gray darkness had already settled over the heavens some time ago.

“If the weather keeps getting worse, the Saxons will stay in their hideouts.”

She nodded.

“Aren’t you the scribe’s daughter? Your name is…”

“Theresa.”

“That’s it. Theresa. You would come to the kiln sometimes to collect lime for tanning parchments. I remember the last time I saw you. You had so many pimples on your face you looked like a bilberry cake. You’ve changed a lot. Do you still work as an apprentice at the parchment-maker’s workshop?”

Theresa’s face hardened, annoyed at being compared to a cake. “Yes. But I’m not an apprentice anymore,” she lied. “I took the examination to become craftswoman.”

“A woman in such a position? Good God! Is that possible?”

Theresa fell silent. She was accustomed to talking to laborers whose greatest talent was pelting dogs with stones, so she merely lowered her head and curled up under the coat. After a while, she slowly stood up again and looked at Hoos more intently. From close up, it was apparent that he was taller than she had first thought. Perhaps even a full head taller than any of the laborers she could remember. He seemed strong and sinewy, probably from his work in the quarry. As Hoos continued to look out through the crack in the wall, she imagined him as one of those great shaggy dogs that lick children affectionately, enduring their mischief with patience, but then could tear anyone to pieces in an instant if they tried to lay a finger on him.

“And what do you do?” she asked. “Your mother boasts about your position in the court.”

“Well,” he smiled, “you know what mothers are like when they talk about their sons. You would be wise to believe only half of what they say. Give them some words of admiration, and then quickly dismiss the other half.”

Theresa laughed. Her father spoke so highly of her that she would redden with embarrassment.

“Three years ago,” Hoos continued, “as fortune would have it I did well in one of the military campaigns undertaken by
Charlemagne. The news reached him, and on my return, he offered me the chance to swear an oath. Which many see as a great privilege.”

“And what does that mean?”

“Well, to put it simply, it means being a vassal of the king. A trusted soldier. Someone to turn to at any time.”

“A soldier? Like those of the
praefectus
of Würzburg?”

“Not exactly,” he laughed. “Those men are poor devils who have to obey orders without so much as a murmur for a paltry day’s pay. But I have my own land.”

“I didn’t think soldiers owned land,” she said with surprise.

“Let me see if I can explain. When the king takes your oath, you pledge to serve him loyally, but the oath establishes a mutual agreement which the king usually honors generously. I received twenty arpents of farmland, another fifteen of vines, and forty more of uncultivated land that I will soon begin to plough, so in reality, my life is not so different to that of a comfortable landowner.”

“And on top of that, you must go to war.”

“That’s right. Though generally the levies only go into combat when summer arrives, after the harvest. That’s when I get my gear ready, summon those who will accompany me on the campaign, and respond to the king’s call to arms.”

“And you have serfs, too?” she asked with surprise.

“No, not serfs. Tenant farmers, freedmen, or
mancipia
, call them what you will, but they are not serfs. They are free men, numbering twenty or so, including men and women. Obviously, I could not work the land alone. Fortunately, Aquis-Granum is overrun with dispossessed folks from every corner of the kingdom: Aquitanians, Neustrians, Austrasians, and Lombards… They come to the court believing they will make their fortune and end up destitute, begging for a crust of bread to ease their hunger. With so many, all you have to do is use your best judgment determining who to lease the land to.”