Alys Clare - Mist Over the Water

‘He did not die there, our beloved Alfred.’ Lord Edmund picked up the story. ‘They had hacked into him and castrated him, for Godwin’s orders were that he was not to be allowed the slimmest chance of fathering a son. Then they brought him here to Ely, and as they led him aboard the boat that was to ferry him across they put out his eyes. Blind and impotent, he was no longer a threat, and nobody cared any more what became of him.’

Castrated. Blinded. Rollo shuddered. It did not bear thinking about.

‘The monks received him with love and tended him with care and skill,’ Lord Edmund went on, ‘for they had loved him and his brother Edward when they were boys and that love stayed true. The healers did their best but it was to no avail, for quite soon Alfred died of his terrible wounds.’

There was a long silence. Then Lord Edmund looked up and, meeting Rollo’s eyes, said, ‘Alfred greatly resembled his brother Edward, as I have said. Edward left no son, for he was a chaste and holy man and his marriage to his queen, Edith, was one of the spirit and not the body. You ask yourself, I do not doubt, how then it is that we are so sure that in Gewis the true blood of the House of Wessex runs pure.’

‘I do,’ Rollo acknowledged.

‘The nature of Alfred Aethling was not like his brother’s, and when temptation came he did not resist,’ Lord Edmund said. ‘What would you have done, Norman spy? Far from friends and kin, perhaps afraid and already suspicious of the man who would soon take your manhood, your eyes and your life, would you in your loneliness have turned your back on love when it was offered?’ Rollo made no answer. ‘Alfred did not. He bedded Alma, the daughter of one of his trusted followers, who loved and pitied him, showing him kindness and tenderness. It is said that in secret they were wed. After Alfred had been torn away from her and suffered his terrible fate, Alma realized she was with child. In time she was delivered of a boy, who, for fear of Harold Harefoot and his brutal, ruthless followers, was taken and hidden in a remote village. He was taught a skill, for he would have to live his life not as a prince of the House of Wessex but as a carpenter. He grew to adulthood and married, and his wife bore a son.’ Rollo felt the power of Lord Edmund’s eyes and, reluctantly, turned to meet their gaze.

‘That man was Edulf and that son is Gewis,’ Lord Edmund said. ‘He is the grandson of Alfred Aethling.’

I tried to prevent Gewis’s great cry, but it was beyond my strength. I had to listen as it tore out of him, bouncing off the vast, soaring walls of the new cathedral and heading out into the night sky.

We had clutched at each other as Lord Edmund told his tale. We had heard them talking as we approached the site of the old Saxon church — my heart had bounced hard as I identified Rollo’s voice — and I wanted to race over to them to let Rollo know we were there and we were with him. But Gewis had stopped me. He shot out an arm and grasped my wrist in a tight grip, pulling hard so that I lurched against him. ‘No!’ he hissed in my ear. ‘Don’t you see? I have to hear this!’

It was only then that I actually took in the words that were being spoken. Then I understood.

As the story went on, and Lord Edmund described what had happened to Alfred Aethling, I could have wept. To be betrayed like that, by a man he had trusted! Then when Lord Edmund spoke of the woman who had born the Aethling’s child, instantly I put myself in her position and my eyes filled with tears. Supposing it had been Rollo and me, I thought. To love someone and then lose them in that unimaginably awful way was bad enough. To discover subsequently that you carried his child — oh, poor, poor woman.

I should have been watching Gewis more closely, for if I had I would surely have noticed that his tension was screwing him up to breaking point, and perhaps I could have comforted him in some way so that he did not react as he did. I don’t know why I was so certain, but as soon as he cried out I knew, sure as the sun rises in the morning, that it was the last thing he should have done.

It was. His great shout distracted Rollo, who spun round to see who had crept up behind him. Lord Edmund took his chance, leaping on Rollo and getting the point of his knife to his throat before I could even blink.

All four of us froze. It was my turn to grasp hold of Gewis. I grabbed his wrist and held on with both hands, for I was terrified that he would rush at Lord Edmund and that the lord would plunge his knife, accidentally or deliberately, into Rollo’s neck.

Lord Edmund stared hungrily at Gewis over Rollo’s shoulder. ‘You have come back, Gewis,’ he breathed. ‘Are you ready now to assume the role to which you were born?’

‘No,’ Gewis said coldly. ‘I don’t believe your story, and, even if I did, I would have no truck with the man who ordered my mother’s death.’

Lord Edmund sighed. ‘Whether you choose to believe it or not, the story is true, Gewis. We who remember and honour the glory days of the House of Wessex preserve our memories closely, and it is well known among us that King Edward and his brother had the distinctive pale colouring that you too possess, as did your father before you.’

‘Many men are fair!’ Gewis protested. I thought he sounded less certain than before.

‘Perhaps,’ Lord Edmund acknowledged, ‘but not to the degree shown by the Wessex men. You are the Aethling’s grandson, Gewis. Believe me.’

Gewis’s mouth opened and closed as if, just for an instant, he had lost the power of speech. Then all at once his eyes shot to the right, to where the last vestige of the ancient church wall still stood, and his whole body went rigid.

I craned round him to see what he was looking at. I saw — or I thought I saw — the shimmering outline of a figure. It was dressed in ragged, pale cloth and down the front, from the level of the crotch, there were rust-coloured stains. More stains discoloured the shoulder and the breast. The face was deathly white, the hair silver in the dim light. There were no eyes; where they should have been were deep, dark sockets.

It is a vision from out of my own imagination! I told myself as I fought panic. It was quite likely, after all, for hadn’t I just heard a tale of horror describing such a figure as this?

It was likely, yes. I might have believed it, except that I had glimpsed it before. And if it existed only in my mind, why, then, could Gewis see it too?

He moaned in dread, and I knew I must act. I had to break the spell and remove us both from whatever enchantment held us in its grip. I took a step back and then launched myself on Gewis, knocking him sideways so that he stumbled and fell.

The apparition vanished. I spared one quick glance at the spot where it had been, and then my head spun round because I had heard Rollo cry out.

In the first dreadful instant I thought Lord Edmund had stabbed him. But immediately my eyes met his I realized it was a shout of warning. I whipped round to look behind me and saw the four burly guardians coming striding across the open ground towards us.

Even with Rollo fighting beside us, the odds against the three of us were tough. Without him, Gewis and I might as well have given up straight away. I launched myself at Lord Edmund, my mouth open in a snarl, and as I leapt at him my teeth closed on the hand that held the knife. I wish I could say that my carefully thought out strategy was a success, but for one thing it wasn’t thought out and for another it wasn’t all that successful. Rollo got away, yes, but not without a deep wound in his shoulder. Lord Edmund’s knife also tore into my cheek, but I barely noticed.

I did not see what happened next but, suddenly, Lord Edmund was on the ground, and Rollo had a bloodstained knife in his hand.