The Buried Giant (24 page)

“What would you have me do, sir? I did all I could. Hid myself in that airless place. Overcame the beast though it had devoured many brave men before us. Then at the end of it all, the boy runs back to the monastery! Am I to give chase with this heavy armour and sword? I’m all done in, sir. All done in. What’s my duty now? I must pause and think it over. What would Arthur have me do?”

“Are we to understand, Sir Gawain,” Beatrice asked, “that it was you in the first place came to tell the abbot of Master Wistan’s real identity as a Saxon warrior from the east?”

“Why go through it again, mistress? Did I not lead you to safety? So many skulls we trod upon before coming out to this sweet dawn! So many. No need to look down, one hears their cackle with each tread. How many dead, sir? A hundred? A thousand? Did you count, Master Axl? Or were you not there, sir?” He was still a silhouette beside a tree, his words sometimes hard to catch now the birds had begun their early chorus.

“Whatever the history of this night,” Axl said, “we owe you much thanks, Sir Gawain. Clearly your courage and skill remain undiminished. Yet I too have a question to put to you.”

“Spare me, sir, enough. How can I chase a nimble youth up these wooded slopes? I’m drained, sir, and perhaps not just of breath.”

“Sir Gawain, were we not comrades once long ago?”

“Spare me, sir. I did my duty tonight. Is that not enough? Now I must go find my poor Horace, tied to a branch so he wouldn’t wander, yet what if a wolf or bear comes upon him?”

“The mist hangs heavily across my past,” Axl said. “Yet lately I find myself reminded of some task, and one of gravity, with which I was once entrusted. Was it a law, a great law to bring all men closer to God? Your presence, and your talk of Arthur, stirs long-faded thoughts, Sir Gawain.”

“My poor Horace, sir, so dislikes the forest at night. The hooting owl or the screech of a fox is enough to frighten him, no matter he’ll face a shower of arrows without flinching. I’ll go to him now, and let me urge you good people not to rest here too late. Forget the young Saxons, the pair of them. Think now of your own cherished son waiting for you at his village. Best go on your way quickly, I say, now you’re without your blankets and provisions. The river’s near and a fast tide on it flowing east. A friendly word with a bargeman may secure you a ride downstream. But don’t dally here, for who knows when soldiers will come this way? God protect you, friends.”

With a rustle and a few thumps, Sir Gawain’s form disappeared into the dark foliage. After a moment, Beatrice said:

“We didn’t bid him farewell, Axl, and I feel poorly for it. Yet that was a strange leave he took of us and a sudden one.”

“I thought so too, princess. But perhaps he gives us wise counsel. We should hurry on to our son and never mind our recent companions. I feel concern for poor Master Edwin, yet if he’ll hasten back to the monastery, what can we do for him?”

“Let’s rest just a moment longer, Axl. Soon we’ll be on our way, the two of us, and we’d do well to seek a barge to speed our journey. Our son must be wondering what keeps us.”

Chapter Eight

The young monk was a thin, sickly-looking Pict who spoke Edwin’s language well. No doubt he had been delighted to have in his company someone nearer his own age, and for the first part of the journey down through the dawn mists, he had talked with relish. But since entering the trees, the young monk had fallen silent and Edwin now wondered if he had in some way offended his guide. More likely the monk was simply anxious not to attract the attention of whatever lurked in these woods; amidst the pleasant birdsong, there had been some strange hissings and murmurs. When Edwin had asked once again, more from a wish to break the silence than for reassurance, “So my brother’s wounds seemed not to be mortal?” the reply had been almost curt.

“Father Jonus says not. There’s none wiser.”

Wistan, then, could not be so badly hurt. Indeed, he must have managed this same journey down the hill not long ago, and while it was still dark. Had he had to lean heavily on the arm of his guide? Or had he managed to go mounted on his mare, perhaps with a monk holding steady the bridle?

“Show this boy down to the cooper’s cottage. And take care no
one sees you leave the monastery.” Such, according to the young monk, had been Father Jonus’s instruction to him. So Edwin would soon be reunited with the warrior, but what sort of welcome could he expect? He had let Wistan down at the first challenge. Instead of hurrying to his side at the first sign of battle, Edwin had run off into the long tunnel. But his mother had not been down there, and only when the tunnel’s end had finally appeared, distant and moon-like in the blackness, had he felt lifting from him the heavy clouds of dream and realised with horror what had occurred.

At least he had done his utmost once he had emerged into the chilly morning air. He had run almost the whole way back up to the monastery, slowing only for the steepest slopes. Sometimes, pushing through the woods, he had felt himself lost, but then the trees had thinned and the monastery had appeared against the pale sky. So he had gone on climbing and arrived at the big gate, breathless and with his legs aching.

The small door beside the main gate was unlocked, and he had managed to collect himself sufficiently to enter the grounds with stealthy care. He had been aware of smoke for the latter part of his climb, but now it tickled his chest, making it hard not to cough loudly. He knew then for sure it was too late to move the hay wagon, and felt a great emptiness opening within him. But he had pushed the feeling aside for another moment, and pressed on into the grounds.

For some time he came across neither monk nor soldier. But as he moved along the high wall, ducking his head so as not to be spotted from some far-off window, he had seen below the soldiers’ horses crowded together in the small yard inside the main gate. Bound on all sides by high walls, the animals, still saddled, were circling nervously, even though there was scarcely space to do so without colliding. Then as he came towards the monks’ quarters, where another of his age might well have rushed on to the central courtyard, he had had the presence of mind to recall the geography of the grounds and
proceed by a roundabout route, utilising what he remembered of the back ways. Even on reaching his destination, he had placed himself behind a stone pillar and peered round cautiously.

The central courtyard was barely recognisable. Three robed figures were sweeping wearily, and as he watched, a fourth arrived with a pail and tossed water across the cobbles, setting to flight several lurking crows. The ground was strewn in places with straw and with sand, and his eyes were drawn to the several shapes covered over with sackcloth, which he supposed to be corpses. The old stone tower, where he knew Wistan had held out, loomed over the scene, but this too had changed: it was charred and blackened in many places, especially around its arched entryway and each of its narrow windows. To Edwin’s eyes the tower as a whole appeared to have shrunk. He had been craning his neck around the pillar to ascertain if the pools surrounding the covered shapes were of blood or of water, when the bony hands had grasped his shoulders from behind.

He had twisted around to find Father Ninian, the silent monk, staring into his eyes. Edwin had not cried out, but had said, in a low voice, pointing towards the bodies: “Master Wistan, my Saxon brother. Does he lie there?”

The silent monk appeared to understand, and shook his head emphatically. But even as he raised a finger to his lips in the familiar manner, he had stared warningly into Edwin’s face. Then, glancing furtively around him, Ninian had tugged Edwin away from the courtyard.

“Can we be certain, warrior,” he had asked Wistan the day before, “the soldiers will really come? Who’ll tell them we’re here? Surely these monks believe us but simple shepherds.”

“Who knows, boy. Perhaps we’ll be left in peace. But there’s one I fancy may betray our presence here, and even now the good Brennus may be issuing his orders. Test it well, young comrade. Britons
have a way of dividing a bale from within with wooden slats. We need it pure hay all the way down.”

He and Wistan had been in the barn behind the old tower. Having for the moment done with woodcutting, the warrior had been seized by the urge to load the rickety wagon high with the hay stored at the back of the shed. As they had set about this task, Edwin had been required at regular intervals to clamber up onto the bales and prod into them with a stick. The warrior, observing carefully from the ground, would sometimes make him go over a section again, or order him to thrust a leg as far down as possible into a particular spot.

“These holy men are just the sort to get absent-minded,” Wistan had said by way of explanation. “They may have left a spade or pitchfork in the hay. If so, it would be a service to retrieve it for them, tools being scarce up here.”

Although at that point the warrior had given no hint as to the purpose of the hay, Edwin had known straight away it had to do with the confrontation ahead, and that was why, as the bales had piled up, he had asked his question about the soldiers.

“Who’ll betray us, warrior? The monks don’t suspect us. They’re so concerned with their holy quarrels, they hardly glance our way.”

“Maybe so, boy. But test there too. Just there.”

“Can it be, warrior, it’s the old couple will betray us? Surely they’re too foolish and honest.”

“They may be Britons, but I don’t fear their treachery. Yet you’d be wrong to suppose them foolish, boy. Master Axl, for one, is a deep fellow.”

“Warrior, why do we travel with them? They slow us at every turn.”

“They slow us, right enough, and we’ll part ways soon. Yet this morning as we set off, I felt eager for Master Axl’s company. And I
may wish for more of it yet. As I say, he’s a deep one. He and I may have a little more to discuss. But just now let’s concentrate on what faces us here. We must load this wagon in a sure and steady way. We need pure hay. No wood or iron there. See how I depend on you, boy.”

But Edwin had let him down. How could he have gone on sleeping for so long? It had been a mistake to lie down at all. He should simply have sat upright in the corner, napping a few winks the way he had seen Wistan do, ready at the first noise to start to his feet. Instead, like an infant, he had accepted from the old woman a cup of milk, and fallen into a deep sleep in his corner of the chamber.

Had his real mother called him in his dreams? Perhaps that was why he had remained asleep for so long. And why, when he had been shaken awake by the crippled monk, instead of rushing to the warrior’s side, he had followed after the others down into the long, strange tunnel, for all the world as if he were still in the depths of dreaming.

It had been his mother’s voice without doubt, the same voice that had called to him in the barn. “Find the strength for me, Edwin. Find the strength and come rescue me. Come rescue me. Come rescue me.” There had been an urgency there he had not heard the previous morning. And there had been more: as he had stood at that open trap-door, staring down at the steps leading into the darkness, he had felt something pull at him with such force he had become giddy, almost sick.

The young monk was holding back blackthorn with a stick, waiting for Edwin to go ahead of him. Now at last he spoke, though in a hushed voice.

“A short cut. We’ll soon see the roof of the cooper’s cottage.”

As they came out of the woods to where the land swept down into the receding mist, Edwin could still hear movement and hissing in the nearby bracken. And he thought of the sunny evening towards the end of summer, when he had talked with the girl.

He had not at first seen the pond that day, for it had been small and well hidden by rushes. A cloud of brightly coloured insects had flown up before him, an event normally to draw his attention, but on this occasion he had been too preoccupied by the noise coming from the water’s edge. An animal in a trap? There it was again, behind the birdsong and the wind. The noise followed a pattern: an intense burst of rustling, as of a struggle, then silence. Then soon, more rustling. Approaching cautiously, he had heard laboured breathing. Then the girl had been before him.

She was lying on her back in the rough grass, her torso twisted to one side. She was a few years older than him—fifteen or sixteen—and her eyes were fixed on him without fear. It took a while to realise her odd posture had to do with her hands being tied under her body. The flattened grass around her marked the area where, by pushing with her legs, she had been sliding about in her struggles. Her cloth smock, tied at the waist, was discoloured—perhaps soaked—all along one side, and both her legs, unusually dark-skinned, bore fresh scratches from the thistles.

It occurred to him she was an apparition or a sprite, but when she spoke her voice had no echo to it.

“What do you want? Why have you come?”

Recovering himself, Edwin said: “If you like, I could help you.”

“These knots aren’t difficult. They just tied me more tightly than usual.”

Only now did he notice her face and neck were covered in perspiration. Even as she spoke, her hands, under her back, were busily struggling.

“Are you hurt?” he asked.

“Not hurt. But a beetle landed on my knee just now. It clung on and bit me. There’ll be a swelling now. I can see you’re still too much of a child to help me. It doesn’t matter, I’ll manage myself.”

Her gaze remained fixed on him, even as her face tightened
and she twisted and raised her torso a little way off the ground. He watched, transfixed, expecting at any moment to see the hands come out from under her. But she sagged down defeated and lay in the grass, breathing hard and staring angrily at him.

“I could help,” Edwin said. “I’m good with knots.”

“You’re just a child.”

“I’m not. I’m nearly twelve.”

“They’ll come back soon. If they find you’ve untied me, they’ll beat you.”

“Are they grown-ups?”

“They think they are, but they’re just boys. Older than you though and there’s three of them. They’d like nothing better than to beat you. They’ll force your head into that muddy water until you pass out. I’ve watched them do it before.”