Nicola Griffith - Hild

She saw patterns everywhere. Where before she had seen flowers humming and rippling with bees, now she saw that bees liked red flowers best. Red and striped.

“Plant more phlox,” she told Rhin. “Phlox, red clover, campion.” She didn’t bother to explain. She didn’t repeat herself. More red meant more honey, which meant more mead, and therefore more people willing to listen. She was going to need people to listen, or Cian would die and Elmet with him. Edwin would not like this news. She needed time to think, to plan, before Edwin heard it.

As the days cooled the colours around her did, too. Bright red flowers were replaced by dark red berries. The sun set earlier. The berries now were tinged with blue. Perhaps it was warmth that made the colour. Red meant life. Blue meant the blue lips of harsh breathing and death. The end of things.

She rode out often on her own, or walked, from dawn to dusk, watching everything. Cows, she noticed, stood broadside to the sun on a cool day, but nose into the wind, and otherwise, when sleeping, when chewing, pointed their head or tail south.

Then she realised deer also lined up north to south.

There were patterns everywhere. She saw it in the tiny yellow clusters of a late daisy, and they reminded her of the seeds on a strayberry. There was an order there, she could almost taste it, but she couldn’t articulate it. If she just kept looking it would all come clear.

Migrant peregrines began to arrive. The young, first. Brown and buff. Females followed by smaller males. Why were young birds so dull? It was always the same, no matter what kind of bird. The adults, which followed days later, were much more definite: blue-black on top, whitish barred with grey beneath. Did that mean something?

The sky turned grey. Grass bleached. Leaves fell. More rumours came from Gwynedd: Cadwallon was readying ships in Less Britain. Eadfrith ætheling was planning to stay in Caer Uisc with Clemen for Yule. Boldcloak’s woman was with child.

When Morud brought the message from Caer Loid that the king wanted his seer in York, Gwladus was already packing.

Hild stood before Edwin still in her travel cloak. The queen was with him, and Paulinus and Coelfrith, but no others, not even the endlessly scratch-scratch-scratching Stephanus.

Edwin’s eyes were red-rimmed. “What the fuck is Boldcloak doing?”

Killing us all. But the habit of protection was too strong.

She flicked dirt off a fold of her cloak. “Being a man, my king.”

“With the Twister’s own daughter?” Paulinus said.

“With all of them, no doubt.”

Silence.

“He is young,” said Æthelburh. “And he feels like a conqueror.”

“ I’m the conqueror.”

“Yes, my lord,” said Paulinus. “He’s a gesith getting above himself.”

“He’s thinking with his breeches, lord King,” Hild said. “As young men do.”

“I never did.”

And Hild, surprised, realised he was right. She had never seen him take a woman after a battle. “You’re a king, lord. Cian is a king’s man. Your loyal man.”

“But to get her with child!”

Hild bent her head. Cian had been stupid.

“Perhaps it’ll bring Cadwallon back,” Æthelburh said.

“It’s too late in the year for a ship to cross from Frankia,” the Crow said dismissively.

Hild wondered at that. Frankia, not Less Britain? She wondered, too, why the queen didn’t have the Crow flayed for such a tone. But the Crow was right, it didn’t matter for now: No one could cross the sea, whether from Frankia or Less Britain, until spring. And there were other things to worry about.

“Cadwallon has two daughters,” she said.

“Oh, by the Christ! Don’t tell me he’s taken the other one, too.”

“No, King. In my worst dreams, she’s in Penda’s bed.”

Edwin’s eyes swarmed green and black, but he turned his gaze not to her but to his queen and reeve and priest. “Just why didn’t any of you think to mention this before?” He swung back to Hild. “And where the fuck have you been ?”

The winter was mild. To Hild it seemed as though every woman in hall was swelling with child. Except Æthelburh, who smiled relentlessly at other women’s bellies. The queen seemed truly happy only when James arrived for the twelve days of Yule and led a new choir for the Christ Mass. When he went back to Craven, the queen went back to smiling and keeping her own counsel. It occurred to Hild that for a royal woman it must be like living as a hostage in an armed camp. Paulinus was her go-between. Was this how it was for Hereswith, how it had been for her own mother?

She tried to talk to her mother about it, but Breguswith—like Begu—was spending most of her time with her man. She seemed impatient: no armies were moving, no messages could cross the winter seas, no one could do anything about anything until spring. Why didn’t Hild stop thinking and just enjoy herself? Hild wondered if her mother had been possessed by an ælf or if this was just how it was with a man in your life. She could no more stop thinking than stop breathing.

She thought about marrying Penda. Edwin would like it. One of the conditions for the marriage would be Penda’s conversion. Edwin would be his godfather and therefore Penda’s overking. Overking of all the Anglisc.

Paulinus would like it. With all the Anglisc converted, he’d get his pallium at last. He could die happy, knowing that as overbishop he’d sit in heaven at the right hand of the pope.

Penda would like it. Her kin ties were strong, her advice better than gold. She was young and strong. She could manage a household—she could manage a kingdom.

Would she like it? If Penda was as cunning as she thought, she might like him well enough. She could take Begu with her. And her household.

One day when Uinniau was out hunting with Oswine, she asked Begu how she thought Uinniau would like to be her chief gesith. When she got married.

“Who are you marrying?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Because the queen hasn’t said anything. And I thought the king didn’t want to let you go. You’re his seer. Oh, have you annoyed the Crow again?”

“No. Uinniau. Would he like it?”

“Why wouldn’t he like it? I’d like it, anyway. I don’t want him going off to war anymore. He’s done enough now so that Luftmaer can write a song or two for our children. Only I suppose it wouldn’t be Luftmaer who’d be doing the singing, would it?”

Everything would be different. Everybody.

“Do you suppose he’d get fat, like Bassus? Sitting at home safe and sound while everyone went off to war with your husband king. And, oh, Oeric would be cross.”

“Oeric could never be a queen’s chief gesith.”

“You do have someone in mind. I knew it. Or is this just one of your endless plots? It’s winter. You really should just drink some more and find someone to play with. You spend too much time in your head. I wish you’d take Gwladus to your bed again. If you won’t do that, at least climb a tree or something. You’ll start looking like the Crow, nothing but bones and a beaky nose.”

That evening Hild watched Paulinus at meat, eating little, covering his cup with his hand. He was a foreigner, like Æthelburh, a long way from home. But unmarried. A bit like a seer. Did his god talk to him? Did it make him feel the way she did when she felt the pattern looking out at her from every blade of grass, every leaf, every beetle’s wing? Had he watched beetles when he was a boy, at home? She found she couldn’t imagine him as a boy. Couldn’t imagine him at home, belonging. He had always looked like this: planed and hollowed, eyes hooded, lost to the world of men, honed to nothing but patterns and plans.