The Rood and the Torc Page 27

  Though the day was waning, most of the village of Ezinge was still empty. The peasant farmers were out in the nearby fields, working the ground in preparation for planting—in those places it was not flooded or too soggy. From a few huts, Kristinge heard sounds of craftsmen at work. From one building he smelled the distinctive odor of baking clay and in another the sound of bellows being pumped. At the far end of the village from the chapel was a chieftain’s hall. It was not as big as Finnsburg had been, but easily large enough for a few dozen warriors. Kristinge walked in that direction. He was almost there when he heard voices coming from one of the larger houses to his right. He turned to look just as three men parted the skin hanging on the doorway and stepped out of the house into the village.

  They were traders, judging by their appearance. Or rather, as Kristinge discovered when he looked more closely, two traders and one of their peasant slaves. The peasant was carrying a big pile of woolen cloth—the pallia Fresonica for which the Frisian merchants were so famous. The traders were arguing loudly about whether to go straight to the fairs of St. Denis, or to try the markets of Dorestad first where Frankish traders from the south were likely to be at that time of year. When they saw Kristinge staring at them, they ceased their arguing. One of them looked as though he were about to shout something, but he stopped suddenly and peered at the young monk more closely, as if he recognized him. Kristinge, too, thought the trader looked vaguely familiar.

  “A monk?” the man said in a distrustful voice. “You’re not from Ezinge.”

  “No,” Kristinge replied, trying to figure out where he knew this man from.

  “I know you,” the trader claimed. “Haven’t I seen you in Ezinge before? Or Hwitstan?”

  At the mention of Hwitstan, Kristinge almost froze. Was his identity so quickly discovered? What would they do when they recognized that he was Finn’s son?

  “You know this monk?” the other trader asked. “I didn’t think you did much business with the monasteries.”

  “Not on the Isles,” the first replied, turning away from Kristinge. “Only in Francia from time to time—near Paris.”

  At the mention of Paris the glimmer of recognition solidified in Kristinge’s mind, and he was able to place the memory. This was one of the traders with whom they had bought passage to Danemark in the fall—the one whom they had let off in Hwitstan halfway along the voyage. “Yes, we have met,” Kristinge replied, anxious to direct the trader’s memory away from Hwitstan and toward Francia. “But not here. We met in Paris. I and my companion bought passage on your ships to Danemark.”

  “Danemark?” the second trader asked, in surprise.

  The first trader looked back at Kristinge. He scrutinized him carefully. “Yes. I remember now. But you were not in a monk’s robe then.” He appeared proud to have remembered all that. “So you’re still alive. Didn’t think you’d ever return from that place.”

  Before Kristinge could answer, they turned and started walking again, content to have solved the riddle. He breathed a sigh of relief. But as they walked away, he could hear them speaking still. “Danemark?” the second one asked. “What did he want there?”

  “Never said,” the first replied. “But his way was paid with good coins. I don’t question gold.”

  “Huh,” the second one grunted, as their voices faded. “I wasn’t with you on that trip, but I could have sworn he looked familiar too. But if…”

  Kristinge lowered his head and turned around. He waited until the traders were gone before he resumed his walk toward the chieftain’s hall. Though the spring air was well above freezing, there was already smoke rising from a hearth fire when he came to the door of the hall. That was a promising sign. Kristinge paused outside the entrance just for a minute, pondering what he would say when he entered. Had he been raised as the son of Finn, he would have known the name of the chieftain of Ezinge. But growing up as a young apprentice to the monk-missionary Willimond, there was not reason he needed to have learned it. If he had, he didn’t remember it now. In any case, it was as likely as not that the chieftain had changed. Ezinge was small compared with Domburg and Dorestad, but it was big enough to have its own small war band. Anybody who led the war band in a successful raid—or a successful defense of the village against raiders—would earn the title of chieftain, replacing whoever had ruled before him. Since the chieftain would have owed his allegiance to some Frisian overlord or king, the rule could have changed hands six times in as many years. There was not much Kristinge could do but enter and hope—no, not hope, but pray for the best. Pray he did. Then he entered.

  CHAPTER 14:

  Aelfin, Son of Aeltar

  A familiar voice rang out from the interior of the hall. “Greetings, bard.”

  Bard? The voice caught Kristinge off guard. He had not come to Ezinge as a bard. He blinked in surprise as his eyes tried to adjust to the wood smoke and dim light. How was it that he was already known as a bard?

  “I see you have your harp. That is good.”

  The young monk-bard stood there mute, wondering what to do next. He peered into the hall. Who was speaking? Who recognized him? Who had known he was coming?

  “Enter, bard. Or do you prefer the cold?”

  Kristinge shivered, but not from the cold. Despite the onset of evening air, he was sweating. He searched his mind for some clue about who in Ezinge might know of him. The voice sounded familiar. Where had he heard it before? At least he had been addressed as bard, and not prince. Nonetheless he was unnerved. He wanted to turn and run.

  “I say again, Enter!” This time, the voice was firm and compelling. The command was not followed by a question. Still blinking away the sting of smoke in his eyes, Kristinge obeyed. Nervously he stepped forward, still wracking his mind. Who knew him already, before he even entered the mead hall? And how? His gaze wandered around the interior of the structure looking for some clue. Had he been there before, years earlier? Was it possible that whoever had called him ‘bard’ knew also that he was the son of Finn?

  It did not take him long to search the hall. The small wooden building was rectangular in shape, just a little longer than it was wide with a low angular wooden roof supported by eight pillars running in rows along each side. Near the back center was a wide hearthstone surrounded by wooden benches. It was on the center-most bench, the widest of them, that Kristinge’s eyes came to rest. There on the far side of the fire sat a richly dressed chieftain with a large glass drinking horn in hand and a knowing smirk on his face. It was he who had spoken. On either side of the him sat three thanes, also well attired. Two servants, less well dressed though by no means poorly provided for, stood behind the chieftain waiting for his orders.

  Kristinge walked slowly up the aisle between the mead benches, and approached the hearth where the ruler of Ezinge sat waiting for him. Not able to see clearly in the fluttering shadows and smoky glow of the fire, he could not yet make out a face. When he reached the hearth he bowed, still wondering how this chieftain had known him. The concern left him more than a little nervous, but there was little he could do. He tried again to remember where and when he had heard that voice before. It seemed more recently than seven years past.

  “What?” the chieftain exclaimed, when he saw Kristinge’s monastic robe. “What is this? You are garbed as a monk? Are you a monk or a bard? Tell me!”

  Kristinge flinched. So, he thought: monk or bard? He had been in Friesland barely a day and already he was pressed to the question: monk, bard, or… At least he had not been given the third option: king. Perhaps he would never have to face that choice. As to the other two, though he had no desire to verbalize his decision so soon, at least he already had some answer. Even as Kristinge pondered this, the chieftain rose to his feet. Kristinge saw him better now. He was a tall man, strong and broad of shoulder with legs that looked like tree trunks. He was no longer young. His graying hair and creased forehead were showing the signs of his age. However he was not yet so old that younger warriors w
ould cease to fear him. The stern glance with which he appraised Kristinge’s robe was alone enough to make the young monk back up a step. But it was his charcoal eyes and bushy gray eyebrows that gave him away. Kristinge’s eyes widened in sudden recognition.

  “I see that you are less talkative even than last evening,” the chieftain answered himself. “But now you are the guest and not the host. Still, such silence is a strange trait for a bard. Stranger still for a monk outside his monastery.” He laughed at his own slight on monks. “But as you showed me hospitality beside your fire, I can do no less for you.” He motioned to the servants behind him, who handed forward a bronze mug of Frisian ale and a plate with some cheese and bread.

  “I am honored by your hospitality,” Kristinge finally said, relieved to have discovered how it was that he was already known. So it had been the chieftain of Ezinge whom he had entertained beside his fire the night before. Once again, God had provided in a surprising way. Kristinge was now all the more glad that he had not withheld the last of his bread. The question did not escape his mind as to why the chieftain had been traveling alone such a distance from his village, but it was a question he knew not to ask.

  “I have been awaiting you,” the chieftain went on, as he took his bench again and motioned for Kristinge to do the same. “You took longer than I expected.”

  Kristinge sat down and took a swig of the ale. It was strong and good, and made him realize how thirsty he was. He followed the first swig with a longer draught before speaking in his own defense. “I was on foot. I saw from the tracks that you had a horse.”

  “So I did,” the chieftain replied. There was a hint of humor in his voice as he went on. “So you are a bard, a monk, and a tracker.”

  “I am no tracker. The hoof prints were unmistakable.” Only after he finished saying this did Kristinge realize that the chieftain had been ridiculing him.

  “Then that leaves bard and monk. Which is it?”

  “I am a monk, first,” Kristinge replied, as if the answer were easier than it was. And even in this answer, he felt trapped. “But I have been called a bard, and I will serve in that way when the need or duty arises.”

  “The need for a bard may arise soon,” the chieftain replied, ignoring Kristinge’s other answer. “Tell me first, what is your name?” He was watching closely as he asked this.

  “I am Kristinge.”

  “Kristinge,” the chieftain repeated with a slight nod. His eyes narrowed and his brow creased even further, as if he were dredging up some distant memory.

  Again, Kristinge grew nervous. “Kristinge of Luxeuil,” he added. It was a trick he had learned from some hunters in Danemark—disguising his scent with a stronger, different scent. He wondered if it would work.

  “Luxeuil? I have heard of this place. A monastery. It is far south, beyond the lands of the Franks.”

  “Among the Franks. It is in the Vosges mountains.”

  The chieftain narrowed his eyes. “You do not look Frankish.”

  “I have mixed blood,” Kristinge replied, risking as much of the truth as he dared expose at the time. Even that was foolish. How many could boast of a Danish mother and a Frisian father? He went on, again hoping to change the subject before the chieftain could ask any more questions. “And now already I must ask for your forgiveness. I should know the name of the chieftain whose hall I have entered, but I have not traveled through these parts in many years, and so I must confess my own ignorance. Yet if I am called as a bard, I would know whom I serve.”

  “I am Aelfin, son of Aeltar,” the chieftain replied. The name sounded familiar to Kristinge, but again he couldn’t place it right away. “And if your singing last night is a sample of your abilities, then I would have you sing for us this very evening.”

  As his earlier answer to Aelfin had indicated—and as he had told Willimond and Hildeburh even before his departure from Danemark—Kristinge had finally decided that when he returned to Friesland it would be as a monk, not as the son of a chieftain, nor even as a bard. Or rather as a priest, for what was a monk without a monastery? Yes, as a priest. As best as he could, Kristinge would fill the role vacated by Willimond seven years earlier. Had not Willimond himself passed on that calling? As to the prophecies that had been made about him by Osanne and others, he had pushed those from his mind. Still, he couldn’t help but ask of Aelfin, “You are in need of a bard, then?”

  “Ah. No,” Aelfin replied, at once both relieving and disappointing Kristinge. “I have a very apt bard. So skilled is he that he feels no threat from traveling bards and minstrels. Dyflines is his name. An Irish bard with a gift of story. I have no desire to replace him. If you join us this evening, you will hear him yourself.”

  Another bard? Kristinge grimaced inwardly at the memory of Sceaptung. “Then I need not bring my harp?”

  “Bring your harp. Unless you prefer to sing without it! I have told you. Dyflines fears no competitors. He will listen to you, and applaud you if you are good. And if you are not, he will show you such skill of his own that you might not lift your own harp ever again. But come, I have heard you myself and know that you have nothing to fear.”

  “Again, I am honored by your hospitality, as well as by your confidence” Kristinge replied, bowing his head.

  “Still,” Aelfin went on. “You have not told me what took you so long?” He picked up his drinking horn as he spoke, and took a long draught. Yet his eyes did not leave Kristinge as he waited for an answer.

  “It is a long way on foot. Longer than I…” —he was about to say remembered, but he caught his own mistake and changed it quickly—“… expected.”

  “Yes,” Aelfin said shrugging. But he demonstrated that he knew much of what went on in Ezinge, as a good chieftain should. “Yet once you arrived in the village, you were some time before you came here. Surely it did not take you all that time to find this hall?”

  Kristinge answered without thinking. “I went first to the chapel.”

  “Of course,” Aelfin replied slyly. “You are a monk first, and a bard second. But tell me, how did you know there was a chapel here?”

  Already Kristinge had let his tongue slip and given away more than he intended. He knew it. What was he to say now? Any answer he gave would raise suspicions. Fortunately, he was rescued a moment later. For as he sat there fumbling for an answer, in through the door came a half dozen thanes and warriors, and with them another man who had to be the bard Dyflines. He was tall and lean, with deep red hair, wiry arms, and a four-stringed lyre held casually over one shoulder. He looked to be a few years older than Kristinge. He was laughing and joking with the thanes as if he knew them well.

  “Greetings, O Great One,” the entering bard said in a voice bordering on sarcasm, and with an exaggerated bow.

  “Sit, and be silent, O Loud and Clumsy One,” Aelfin replied, in a voice that would have sounded much angrier were it not for the smile on his face. “Or I’ll silence you myself with my foot. And you know from past experience how hard is my foot and how well-made my boot!”

  One of the warrior-thanes—one whom Kristinge later learned was a young cousin of Aelfin’s named Maccus—lightly jabbed the back of Dyflines’ locked knees with the butt of his spear, causing the bard to crumble to the floor, which he did with exaggerated dramatics. As Kristinge watched the display, he found himself drawn to this chieftain and his bard, a feeling he had never had with Fjorgest.

  “Better get up quick,” said another thane who had been sitting there silently all the while. “You’ve got competition tonight.”

  Dyflines sprang nimbly to his feet, but he did not appear daunted by the news. “Competition, friend Ceolac?” he asked, addressing the thane who had spoken. “Who will it be? Whom will we have the pleasure of hearing this evening? Have you learned to play the lyre?”

  Of course Kristinge was the only stranger in the hall, and in a moment Dyflines was looking right at him. “A harp-player, I see. Unless the shape of your bag deceives me. Then it wi
ll be a pleasure indeed. Though I, for one, prefer the lyre.” So saying, he spun his lyre deftly in his hand so that the neck rolled over his wrist leaving the instrument laying in his arms ready for playing. He strummed a few notes, then lifted it back over his shoulder and sat down.

  It was not long before food and drink were served, and the small company of two bards, twelve thanes, and the chieftain Aelfin joined together for the evening meal. When the meal was finished, more drink was brought and the bards were called forth to sing. As the guest bard, Kristinge was invited to sing first. At Aelfin’s request he started with Deor’s Lament, followed it with the Seafarer’s Song he had learned among the Danes, and ended with the Song of the Cross-Tree. The three songs were well-received, and even Dyflines’ applause was sincere. When Kristinge was finished, Aelfin rewarded him with a small ring. The monk sang one more song then set down his harp and turned expectantly toward the other bard.

  To Kristinge’s surprise, Dyflines proved as good as Aelfin had promised. The Irish bard’s songs were laced with a strong Celtic flavor, full of fanciful tales of dragons and gods and talking creatures. As if to prove his prowess, he ended with his own version of Deor’s Lament, despite having only just heard it from Kristinge that evening. And though he lost a few words, he made up for the deficiency by spontaneously composing two new verses of his own. It was an impressive feat for a bard, and Kristinge returned the applause. If he had grown proud of his success as a bard in the hall of Fjorgest, then he was humbled now. He was in the presence of a true bard.

  When the singing was finished, more mead was passed around. Kristinge had a second drink, but did not stay long to partake of more food. Something about the chapel drew his thoughts. A short time later he excused himself from the presence of the chieftain, departed from the hall, and returned there. With no place else to spend his first night in Ezinge, he unrolled his blanket on the floor. Yet even all alone in a strange village, there was a deep sense of calm on him that night. He was soon asleep.