Alys Clare - Whiter than the Lily

‘I’m going alone,’ he announced firmly. ‘I do not believe that they will harm me if I go openly by day. I will ask to speak to Aebba and I will find a way to help the poor chained girl.’

‘You can’t. We must all go in together,’ Brice said, equally firmly. ‘We-’

But Josse held up a hand. ‘Let me finish,’ he said. ‘It is unwise for us to move as one for, should we encounter difficulties, there would be none of us left to bring help. I would like you, Brice, to act as my reserve force. Watch for me from a safe distance. If I do not return by a certain prearranged time — by nightfall — then perhaps you will ride down in the dark and see what has become of me.’ He said it with a laugh, as if to suggest he was joking, but it was no joke.

Brice looked at Isabella, who shrugged and then nodded.

‘And if Isabella will agree to wait for us up here on the cliff top,’ Josse went on, ‘then she could go to Readingbrooke for help should-’ No. He stopped himself from saying should neither of us return because it was far too pessimistic. ‘Well, in case it proves necessary,’ he finished instead.

There was a pause. Then: ‘It makes good sense,’ Brice said. With a wry grin, he added, ‘And I do not think that Isabella and I will change your mind, Josse, if we argue for the rest of the day. Very well. So be it. When will you go?’

And Josse replied, ‘I shall not wait for cover of mist or darkness. I shall go right now.’

For the third time, Josse rode down the track and across the marshland to Saltwych.

This time they knew who he was and they were waiting for him. Two of the guards who had apprehended him on his first visit rode out to meet him and, grim faced and silent, fell in on either side of him and rode with him into the settlement. There were few people about; the place appeared almost deserted. One of the guards took charge of the horses; the other man took him to the long hall. Josse expected to be faced with Aelle, but it was not the clan chieftain who waited for him across the hearth.

The strange silver eyes contemplated him for some moments before the man spoke. Then, in a neutral voice, he said, ‘You have returned, Josse d’Acquin. By day now and not sneaking through the dark on your belly like a whipped hound.’

Josse straightened his shoulders. ‘I was told quite definitely that the woman of whom I spoke, Galiena Ryemarsh, came from this community. I came back because I wish to establish the truth.’

‘The truth,’ mused the man with the silver eyes. ‘A dangerous commodity, Josse d’Acquin. Are you quite sure you wish to know it?’

‘I am,’ Josse replied.

‘Even more dangerous,’ went on the man, still in the same quiet, contemplative tone, ‘is your implication that the clan chief lied to you. Aelle does not care to have his word doubted.’

‘But I was told by Galiena’s family that this was where she was born!’ Josse said forcefully. ‘I believe that they spoke true.’

The man said nothing. He stood on the far side of the bright fire in the hearth, and Josse could not see him clearly. He wore a long robe of some light colour and its outline seemed to shimmer in the flickering light. Unaccountably, Josse felt heavy-eyed as he tried to focus on his adversary.

The man held up a long hand and beckoned. Josse stepped around the hearth and went over to stand beside him. ‘Aelle is away hunting,’ the man said softly. ‘He has taken the strong men of the clan. They will not be pleased to see you back here, asking your questions. Oh, no.’

‘Then tell me what I need to know and let me leave before they return!’ Josse urged. ‘I have come in peace, it is not right to threaten me in this way.’

‘You perceive a threat?’ The man’s eyes opened wide with false innocence. Or was it false? Josse could not decide. ‘Well then, we shall have to reassure you.’ He glanced around and, seeing that he and Josse were alone in the far section of the hall, stepped back to the far wall and, lifting the corner of a ragged hanging, revealed a small door. ‘Come,’ he ordered. ‘We shall sit in my own private chamber and I shall attempt to tell you what you wish to know.’

Josse hesitated. The guards had not relieved him of his weapons — perhaps because their chieftain was not in the hall — and he felt the weight of his sword at his side. The silver-eyed man gave a soft laugh. ‘You will not need your sword,’ he said. ‘You would not attack an unarmed man, and I, as you see, carry no knife or broadsword.’ He opened his arms wide and the long, full sleeves opened out gracefully. But he was right; as far as Josse could see, he bore no blade.

‘Will you come?’ he asked.

‘Aye,’ said Josse.

The man carefully closed the door after them and led Josse to a small building that he had not noticed before. It consisted of a shallow cave in the cliff face, out from which walls had been built so as to increase the space within. The man opened a low door in the outer wall and ushered Josse inside.

The chamber was in near-darkness, the only light coming from glowing embers in a small iron brazier. The man put some small pieces of wood on to the embers, blew up a flame and then added a bundle of what looked like dry, twiggy sticks and dead leaves. Then, having drawn up a simple stool for Josse to sit on, he said without preamble, ‘Galiena did come from here. She was known by a different name and she was of high birth among our people.’ Watching Josse closely, he murmured, ‘Iduna was her given name. She was called for the goddess who guarded the golden apples of youth, for it was hoped that her birth was an omen and that she would put new vigour into the chieftain.’

Goddess. Apples of youth. Good God above, Josse thought, these are pagan things.

‘She was the chieftain’s daughter,’ the silver-eyed man was saying, ‘begotten by him upon a woman of the bloodline and born to him in his dotage. We hoped she would heal him, for he was sick at heart and in despair.’

‘It cannot be that you speak of Aelle?’ Josse said.

‘No. Of Aethelfrith, the father of Aelle, who was chieftain before him.’ The man sighed. ‘Aelle saw the responsibilities of a chieftain differently. His father had encouraged us to look outwards, to mix with our neighbours and to end our long self-imposed and inward-looking isolation. He did not think it healthy for us to preserve our secret ways and to keep others away by the fostering and the propagation of frightening legends. That, he considered, was the old way. The unenlightened way.’

‘The old ways worked efficiently,’ Josse murmured, remembering the tale that had so distressed him as a child.

‘Yes, they did, didn’t they?’ The silver-eyed man looked pleased. ‘But then it is very easy to frighten uneducated and superstitious folk out of their wits.’

It was nothing to be proud of, Josse thought. But he did not say it aloud.

‘The baby girl whom we knew as Iduna was healthy and she thrived.’ The man picked up his tale. ‘But the name that we hoped would bring good fortune failed us, and her father died when she was but a few weeks old. With his death there was no choice but to hail Aelle as chieftain. He turned his back on the outside world, shutting out the light just as it had begun to penetrate our life here. And his first act as our chief was to send his little sister away.’

‘Why?’ Josse asked.

‘Why? For two reasons. One, because she too was the daughter of a chief and when she grew to adulthood, she might have thought as her father did and so challenged her brother’s rule of secrecy. For another-’ He paused. Then: ‘Josse, what did you think of Aelle? A clever man, would you say? A wise and worldly one?’