Andrew Offutt - When Death Birds Fly

Wulfhere drew and gusted forth a sigh to fill a galley’s sail, and his belt buckle flashed aureate. “Aye, that’s true,” he said, grudgingly. Having given some vent to his wrath, he began to use his wits-he who’d once said in a time of quiet that Cormac was his wits. “Hmmm, hmmm. Look ye, Wolf, we must draw Raven up the shore and dry her out, or her timbers will soon be waterlogged, and she too heavy for rowing. Well it is that your Armorican summers be bright and warm, Prince! Then the battle-bird must have her careening and re-caulking, for if such work be done not this summer, will mean greater delay next year.”

“True.”

Another sigh; grudging and mournful. “That we cannot afford.”

“Aye. True also,” Cormac said relentlessly.

“Well, then… it needn’t disadvantage us, surely? It were maybe foolish to use Raven in any case. Our battle-bird of the seas is too well known on these coasts. Surprise be the way to deal with Sigebert.”

“Right,” Cormac said, recognizing the nigh wheedling tone of his comrade and playing him as only he could. “Right as the words of a spaewoman.”

“Ah… well then…” Wulfhere’s voice trailed off. “What think ye that we should do?”

Cormac gave him a gift: “Going to be keeping your own plan back to test mine, is it? Why, that must depend on our host. What say ye, Howel? Will ye be lending us a ship, that we might be making a little run to Nantes?”

Howel was sure not to glance at Morfydd, who was frowning. “And gladly!” His smile was genuine. He knew that Wulfhere had been angling for this favour, but knew not how to ask it for himself. The Dane was after all a stranger, while Cormac was the corsair prince’s friend, known to him of old. “It’s the right man ye ask for the loan of a ship, Cormac Art’s son! Ha! When that first Caesar came to these shores, he was amazed to find my ancestors building better ships than any in use on the Mediterranean! He defeated them only because the wind failed them at a crucial time. Even then many escaped to the west of Britain. Great seafarers we have been, in all the generations since! We builded seaworthy ships of oak when the men of the northern lands hadn’t yet heard of sail! No force in that. I’ll be providing you both the means for faring to Nantes-and ye will bring me that verminous Frank’s other ear, won’t ye?”

Wulfhere blew flutteringly through his lips in the manner of a restive horse. He’d his own ideas about the respective merits of southern and northern ships. He was also the prince’s guest. Heroically, he refrained from speaking.

“It took two or three centuries-from the fourth to the seventh-for the decline of the Roman Empire to pass into the creation of medieval Europe… Little by little the Roman roads disappeared beneath the weeds…”

– Larousse Encyclopedia of Ancient and Medieval History

The big black horse crested the rise above a forest glade. It stood for a moment, silhouetted all sleek and shining against the summer sky, while its rider looked this way and that and cocked ear for the sound of the hounds. His finely shaped mouth twisted unhandsomely into a snarl of displeasure. Rotten was the hunting, this day!

A lithe, athletic figure and richly clad, he none the less presented a bizarre appearance, atop his black horse. A stiff mask of black leather covered the man’s brow and cheeks: Indeed, it concealed all his face down to the jawline save for the nose, mouth and chin. The mouth, at least, had healed.

Another man rode up beside him, not so well mounted or clad; his huntsman.

“By death” the masked man snarled. “As well might the weather be howling storm as this bright summer that is a lie, for all the game we’ve roused! I ought to have you flogged, Vafres!”

Vafres’s craggy face lost colour. When his master spoke of flogging he was seldom merely giving vent to idle talk. Nor was it any small punishment for a man to receive.

“I ha’ aroused yourself game when no other man could, sir,” he protested, with respect. “And will again, if ’m spared. This today ’uz the luck o’ the chase. ’Tis God’s will, belike.”

“God’s will!” Sigebert One-ear said contemptuously. “Be silent!”

They had fared far afield in their quest for game. Sigebert decided they were out of the Roman kingdom altogether, and into the forests of Lesser Britain. He knew not for certain, and cared not. He was who he was. He hunted where he would. Armorican peasants and villagers could be no different from other such vermin. Let them beware and be wary.

Behind the leathern mask, hazel eyes narrowed. An arm sleeved in beautiful russet leather soft as cotton lifted, and he pointed to westward.

“Your sight is sharp. There! A village among fields, is it not?”

“Aye sir.”

“We will gather the dogs and make for it. Who knows? There may be some amusement to be had.”

Sigebert’s hand had tightened unconsciously as he turned toward Vafres, and his horse made slight objection to the pressure at its mouth. Sigebert jerked viciously, with both hands. The animal grunted and backed in its attempt to escape the hurtful pull. Vafres shivered, and this time not on his own account. The long ride and lack of game had put his foul-mooded master in a still fouler disposition. Seeking amusement in a little peasantish village, and him in such a mood, could mean that not only the horse would feel his ire. Yet Vafres ventured no comment, but made efficient shift to collect the deerhounds.

They set out through the winding forest ways toward the village, with Sigebert cursing low branches as though they reached out for him apurpose.

Normally he was more urbane than at present, not that he was then more reassuring to be with. He merely inflicted terror in a soft voice. Now, however, his raw facial scars were sending him mad. Pain sent the arrogant young man’s reason aflying. The mask protected his cheek and ear from wind, as it would for some time yet ere they became insensitive enough to tolerate weather. Was his sweat that caused the agony now; it soaked into the mask’s padded lining and irritated the scars so that they itched fiercely. Naturally they could not be scratched and a perverse pride forbade the Frank’s taking the thing off to wipe his face.

The pain of his missing ear was worse. Hot skewers seemed to jab into his head through the hole and burn his brain.

“May those pirate scum be accursed and accursed,” Vafres heard his master mutter, as he savagely broke away a leafy branch.

Sunlight slanted down through dense leaves to scatter coins of brightness on the forest floor. They shifted liquidly across Sigebert’s cloak and the watered-silk hide of his magnificent horse as he rode. After him came Vafres on his grey nag, and the trotting hounds with their tongues out. All trod silently on the soft game trail flanked by haw and willow-herbs.

The grey-skirted woman gathering firewood was taken by surprise. Tall she was, big boned and gaunt, aged beyond her years. Hers were the eyes and lined face and gnarled hands of a work animal. She had added more sticks to her sizable bundle and was lifting it to her shoulders when Sigebert came upon her.

She looked around, up, and stared. Her dull eyes widened at sight of the tall black horse bestridden by the finely-clad man in the macabre mask. Black-masked, black-cloaked, black-vested man on a black horse. Black gloves holding the reins. She stared.

Sigebert looked at her contemplatively. She had no beauty and thus did not interest him. His first impulse was to ride her down. Then another thought struck him and, throwing back his head, he laughed wildly.