Forgotten Prophecies (3 page)

“You are beautiful, young Oswith,” he began.
“Thank you for making yourself beautiful for me.”

“What is going to happen to me and my
baby?”

He looked away and faced the wall. “Young
Wigred and I are going to fight each other for the privilege of
owning this fine farm. It is time I stopped my wanderings and
settled down again. Here is as good a place as any that we have
visited.”

“You are no farmer. You know only of death
and fire.”

“Not so, lady.” He turned to face her again.
“My father had a small farm outside Chichester, a long time ago. He
taught me everything, until the robbers came. Then I had no choice
but to become a bandit myself. Many of these men follow me, but not
all. I could use most of them here to help bring the farm back to
its former prosperity.”

“But only if you kill that other animal in
your contest.”

“If I kill Wigred. He does not follow me. He
is a wayward fellow, with a wife and family at home that he seldom
sees. That is not good. I have no wife; that is why the gods
brought us together today.”

“And if he wins?”

“The gods have not ordained it so. But if
they are mistaken, and he wins, then I shall be dead. And he will
not stay here long. He may keep you for a time, but as for your
baby... it will not be good if he kills me.”

They looked at each other seriously.

“I am going to face him now. Do you want to
come and watch us? It will be a good fight.” He smiled
nervously.

She shook her head.

“Will you wish me luck, then?”

She bent forward, and placed her lips on the
hairy knuckle that clasped the hilt of the sword strapped at this
side. In an instant she turned away to face the wall.

He left her, and walked back to the
courtyard to face Wigred. “It is time,” he announced. “We fight for
the girl. To the death. And we fight with our bare hands
alone.”

The two men looked at each other as they
slowly circled their arena, each waiting for the other to make the
first move. Wigred roared suddenly and charged forward at Eldred,
his hands outstretched to grasp his neck. Eldred – slower but with
so many more years of combat experience – ran to meet him. Before
they clashed, Eldred stepped aside quickly and tripped up his
younger opponent. He was felled before the fight even started; the
older man could hardly believe his luck, for it was as if his
opponent had lain himself down as a ritual sacrifice, in obedience
to a command from the gods.

Seizing the opportunity, Eldred jumped on
his back, pulled back Wigred’s head and repeatedly crashed it
against the rough stone paving. He noticed blood spilling on to the
ground; he had broken his nose. With a few more well-practiced
movements, his adversary’s neck was broken. He hauled up Wigred’s
trunk to examine his face and, satisfied that everything was nearly
finished, he allowed it to fall gently.

“Someone put him out of his misery,” Eldred
called. “He doesn’t deserve a slow death.”

Two men stepped forward and cut Wigred’s
throat: a mercy killing. It was the custom. Then they hauled his
corpse away.

The prophecy that Eldred had forgotten for
so long had at last been fulfilled. There was still so much that
had to come about, but the wheels of destiny had been set in
motion. He would have to deal with the man he had seen with the
girl outside the farm in the moments before they had moved in to
seize the place; he was sure to return, possibly with
reinforcements to defend his property. Eldred would need to find
some way to dispose of this man and anyone who followed him back
here.

At last, the gods seemed to have blessed him
that day.
Or had they?
A dark doubt entered his mind. The
woman had foretold so much else, and her exact words had been long
forgotten. Henceforth, he would have to grasp life in his hands and
put his trust in his own actions.

He would put the old Frankish woman right
out of his head forever, and all the superstitious nonsense she had
told him. The incident would never be spoken of again: the misery
of his time in slavery – and his escape from Neustria – belonged to
an old world, a different world. A new life lay before him here.
Why should he need to cling to silly predictions when he stood on
the threshold of such happiness?

Here I shall live my life afresh,
he
said to himself.
It is an auspicious time for new beginnings.
The gods themselves came down to see my arrival here in her sunlit
hall.

He looked around at his men. They would be
content here.
Our wandering days are over, and we can make a new
life for ourselves.
There was so much to do, and a golden
future would grow from today.
One day, we might be giants in
this land....
Who can tell?
he thought.

He might one day become a folk-hero, a
legend among men; then there would be no reason for him to fear
death when it came. Only the gods knew how his life would spin out,
not some silly old woman who claimed to be clairvoyant.

THE END

Thank you for taking the time to read this
short story – I hope you enjoyed it.

I’ve written some notes on the writing of
this book in my blog at

http://blog.robertcoleman.com/

Robert Coleman spent 14 years in the British
Army in the Middle East, Norway and Germany, before taking another
position in the Ministry of Defence in London.

Subsequently he was offered a role as head of
administration at the London office of an international law firm
and, later, became a management consultant.

Appended on the next few pages is a section
from a short story called

Forgotten Prophecies
, the
prequel to
Where the Guardian Rests.

The third story in this series is currently
in preparation:
Oswith

WHERE THE GUARDIAN
RESTS

by

Robert Coleman

Two
women, sisters, came to Eldred. One carried his new baby. They were
wives of his men, and the woman nursing the child had recently had
a stillbirth, and offered to feed his daughter. He gratefully
accepted the offer.

“What is her
name?” she asked.

“She has no
name yet,” he answered. “I shall name her when her mother has been
buried.”

His mind ran
over the girls’ names that he knew. He would have liked to name her
Elsa, after her mother. It was not the custom to name children
after their parents but, he thought, in this instance there must be
some goodness in the idea, when the daughter’s life replaces the
mother’s. But two people with the same name in the family always
caused confusion with the saga-tellers, and he returned to the idea
of a fresh name for the girl.

It was the
custom for mothers to name their children but, as with Edmund’s
naming, there was no mother to take this role. He would name her at
sunrise in the morning, before Elsa’s burial.

Estrid
– with
the grace and beauty of the rising sun – Estrid would serve her
well enough for a name.

And now he
would have to settle down to life again without the company of a
woman in his bed. There were no free females in the compound; after
a decent interval he would have to enquire in the neighbourhood.
There was nothing like creating a family tie to cement friendship
between the –

“I can see
something!” called an excited voice above him. A face looked down
through a hole in the roof. “Five men – perhaps more – spreading
out towards the huts, and coming this way. They have torches, and
they’re almost up to the ditch!”

“There’s
another group on the other side!” cried a second voice on the
roof.

The men jumped
to their feet, and raced to the door. They had to drive the
intruders towards the old villa, where the others would be ready to
finish them off. Women now stood by with pails and other vessels,
full of water. After the main force had left, a team of youths went
to defend the well just outside the hall, and women would follow
them as soon as it was deemed safe. While the men defended their
lives, the wives would defend their property.

Eldred roared
ferociously, like a demented animal, brandishing his axe and long
knife, and led the chase. The raiding party threw their torches in
the air, lighting up the night sky for a moment; the defenders
parried with stones and other, larger, missiles, before running
after the intruders. Hand-to-hand fighting developed briefly, when
iron met iron and flesh, and the clash of metal and the shouts and
screams of men broke the tranquil night.

The moon lit
the strangers’ faces briefly and slowed down the reactions of all
locked in the combat, anxious not to harm their own men. A confused
moment came and went, and Eldred’s men were soon sweeping the foe
towards their objective, its bold greying walls standing starkly in
the near-blackness.

Guthlaf’s men
appeared behind the retreating invaders and surprised them, exactly
as planned. Two men ran from the melee of stabbing and slashing,
cutting and bruising; Eldred could not see who they were, but it
was soon apparent to him that there were only three of the raiders
left. The others had either fled or fallen.

“Stop
fighting!” he bellowed. “Lay down your arms, pigs, or you die now!
Go and get torches, someone. I want to look at these animals!”

Torches were
brought and thrust before the faces of the disarmed men, their
features shining in defiant sweat.

“I want some
of you to watch out for a counter-attack,” Eldred ordered, before
returning to gaze at the three faces. “Now, what are your names,
and who sent you?”

“Names are of
no account,” said one voice proudly. “You know who we are, and you
will wish to speak more to me than to the others, I think.”

A torch was
moved nearer the speaker. Eldred had seen his eyes before; almost
colourless, it seemed its stark pupils stood alone in their pink
and white insets. But those eyes had belonged to another face he
had slain three years before.

“I am Wiglaf,
brother of Wigred. You have slain my other brother, Wigwulf, in
this skirmish. But remember: others will come one day. I have no
sons, but Wigred left four: Wigherd, Wiglaf, Wigbert and Wigmund.
Remember well those names : for I swear by the gods they shall all
seek you out one day. One day, when you will be old and feeble, and
they will come for you when you are not prepared!”

“Empty words!”
Eldred spat in his face.

A sigh of
self-congratulation breathed through the growing crowd surrounding
the captives.

He remembered
another age when he had been warned that powerful men might come
after him. He and Guthlaf had been young then, when they were
running from their slavery in Paris; the gods might not be so
indulgent this time. But he could not share this unease with his
men.

“What shall we
do with this scum, Guthlaf?” Eldred beamed.

There was no
answer.

“Eh, Guthlaf?”
he called again. Everyone looked round.

There was a
moan in the darkness behind him. “He’s here,” a man called. “He’s
been killed.”

Eldred ran to
the spot where his old friend lay. Someone lowered a torch beside
the body. Guthlaf lay in the ditch; there was a gaping wound in his
chest. The First Man had taken his friend as well as his wife in
payment.

“Close his
eyes,” he whispered urgently.

His constant,
dear old friend had taken with him a secret learned of Oswith. No
man knew it now.

“What shall we
do with the prisoners, Eldred?” asked one of the men.

“We bury them
in the morning,” he growled. “Alive.”

The crowd
began to disperse; as an afterthought, Eldred stood on a bench to
speak again.

“And in the
morning, we shall all go to the First Man’s grave to give him
thanks for his protection this night. And from this time forth, he
shall be known as The Guardian. His spirit lives still among us; he
is but resting, and is ready to come to our aid when we need him.
He must never be forgotten.”

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