Ærra Geola, 879 AD

"We don't both hafta be here to watch the wares, you know." Sal said as they hauled baskets of their hard-earned salt out of the wagon and closer to the river.

"This is a madhouse, Sal, I'm not going anywhere right now." Godric laughed in disbelief as he flung a hand out to gesture at 'the madhouse'. The trading shore at Queenhithe was a writhing throng of people, all crushed together and bound and determined to get exactly what they needed, right now, everyone else be damned. It was a typical market. Godric had already skidded on fish guts at least twice, and they weren't even anywhere near any fishmongers.

It had been a long journey to London, and the day would tell if it had been worth it.

This was the first year that the Hal, under Godric's exuberant leadership, had been able to produce salt from the river. It had been a tricky business, as they (read: Sal) had had to resort to a certain amount of sleight of hand to convince the Bishop of Worcester that the salt they were selling here in Lundenwic with his blessing had actually been produced in his boiling houses, and not in the dead of night on the shore of the Salwarpe via copious and intense use of hot-air charms. Bacca of the sceat, that eternal optimist, wouldn't shut up about during the whole process about how the salt tasted funny and how using hot air charms on it would get them all strung up for witchcraft; Sal had eventually threatened to dump the whole load of it in Bacca's precious fields instead of selling it. He had been much more helpful after that.

They and the villagers had evaporated salt by wand night after night during the long, hot summer, and now that the harvest season had ended they had made the long, cold journey to Lundenwic to sell their hard-earned wares.

Once they had unloaded all the baskets from the cart, they settled in for the day; Godric used his height and roaring voice to attract customers, and once they came near enough for Salazar to pitch to, they inevitably walked away with emptier wallets and more salt than they knew what to do with.

Within a couple of hours their supply of salt to sell was dwindling and their moneybag was fit to burst.

Godric had just flipped a coin happily and suggested that they pack up their wares for the day and treat themselves to a hot lunch when there was a sharp burst of screaming from the street just uphill from the wharf. Heads all along the river started turning as the crowd surrounding the source of the noise rippled out and away from whatever had happened; seconds later the movement intensified and a crush of people were forced into the merchants' area along the bank.

Without hesitation, Godric plunged into the stream of people retreating downhill, ignoring Salazar's shout that it was none of his business. Behind him, his friend rolled his eyes sharply, stuffed their moneybag into his tunic, and waded in after him.

Despite the difficulty in pushing against the current of the crowd, they quickly approached the source of the panic – Godric had reached a formidable height, even at 19, and with the way he was filling out people tended to move out of his way. Salazar followed in his wake, trying to skim as much as he could from the surfaces of minds passing by.

"Godric, whatever happened – it's definitely wiccung. These mocelas are terrified an' half of them are prayin' for salvation."

"I can tell that for myself, Sal – look up!"

Ahead of them, hovering in the air above whatever had happened, was some kind of dark cloud. A deafening droning filled the air as they approached, and they slowed down as they realized simultaneously that the cloud was made up of thousands and thousands of bees. Several skeps had been knocked over near the edge of the street, where two foreign women were standing, both staring up at the cloud in disbelief.

A third person, an Englishman by the looks of him, stood just downhill of the women, red-faced and sweating in fear at the sight of the enormous swarm. He held some kind of document in one hand and seemed to have been accosting one of the women, as he had a scrap of her sleeve clenched in the other fist.

"You're-you-a wicce! Wiccung!" He stuttered, face graying to the color and appearance of curdled milk in his fear. Godric and Salazar came up behind him as the swarm started to move faster in the sky.

"Is there some kind of problem here?" Godric asked, all good manners as they approached.

"P-problem? Are you blind?! This woman was threatening me, and when I defended myself she used her heathen powers to summon these bees!" the man shouted shrilly.

The taller woman stepped forward haughtily, ready to defend her companion, but Godric was faster.

"Let me rephrase that – it's time for you to go now and leave these women alone." Godric stated, still with the same genial smile on his face.

The man's eyes bulged out even further and he stumbled backwards, throwing his arms above his head and screaming to the masses above and below them on the street -

"Help! Help! They're all wiccas!"

Unfortunately for him, the already-riled swarm of bees was disturbed by his movements; there was little warning before the dark cloud turned and swept down on the unprotected crowd like a hurricane.

Both Godric and the taller woman reacted immediately, raising shields above themselves and their companions, but the terrified Englishman was not so lucky; he stood in the immediate path of the cloud pouring down the street toward the river and died where he stood.

Luckily for the four of them, the shields held well against the onslaught of angry bees until the swarm had passed on its way to cross the Thames.

Less luckily, most of the mocelas who escaped being stung to death looked uphill and saw four people standing unscathed, with two wands raised to the sky.

Erroneous or not, it was not a hard conclusion to make that those wands were responsible for the unholy and unnatural incident which had just occurred.

The four looked downhill and saw hundreds of confused, fearful and angry mocelas staring back at them. A susurrus of suspicion swept up the hill, and this built quickly into a roar as seemingly everyone present at Queenhithe at once decided they were at fault and should be held responsible.

Seconds later they were engulfed in the forming mob and swept away from one another; thankfully separated from one another and with wands hastily put away they were much less recognizable to the violent and vengeful hive mind of the crowd.

The black-haired man slid up to her side in the growing chaos, but when he leaned in to speak Helga pushed him back.

"You'll step on the bees!"

She was blushing hotly even as she said it, aware of how silly it sounded, but she met his gaze squarely.

He pulled a strange face of wryly amused annoyance, but he looked where he put his feet when he moved close again.

"Sorry, it's just that they came to my aid and they got so hurt because of me-" she got out in one fast burst, embarrassed.

"You don't hafta apologize to me. I understand the value of allies." he had to shout to be heard over the riotous din. She watched the big man with the mane of hair go past, grappling with a mocel even bigger than himself.

"They're my friends, not my allies!" she shouted back

He shrugged.

"Same thing when it comes down to it, ain't they? Listen! I didn't come over here to talk philosophy – we need to get out of here! Where's your Danish friend?"

Helga turned and scanned the crowd quickly, soon finding the Lady a scarce fifteen feet away, her pale hair a beacon in the sea of people.

But they were quickly being swept further apart from one another; the crowd was only growing larger and angrier and the force of it would soon focus in on what it had originally gathered against. They were running out of time.

She was startled when the black-haired man suddenly grabbed her hand.

"What are you doing?!" she shouted.

"Trust me, an' just don't let go!"

He began plowing his way through the crowd toward where she had last seen the Lady, hand clasped warmly in hers. To her shock no one protested their passing; it was like they had become invisible. It took them only a few minutes to push through to where the Lady stood, looking frantically around.

"There you are! Where did you go? I thought the crowd had gotten you!" she cried when she spotted Helga coming toward her.

"There's time for that later; we needta get to the edge of this an' find my idiot friend." the black-haired man interrupted them. He was gritting his teeth and wore an expression of ferocious concentration as he plunged into the crowd again, the two women right behind him.

They had almost made it to the edge of the mob, and Helga had raised an arm to signal the big man fighting his way to join them, when the stone was thrown.

It clipped the black-haired man over the ear; his head snapped to the side and he clearly lost hold of whatever he had been concentrating so hard on.

To Helga's horror, the mocelas nearby immediately stopped shoving each other and turned toward the three of them, raising their weapons and shouting to alert the rest of the mob that the wiccas were here.

To her right, the Lady had frozen, staring at the sea of hateful faces around them. To her left, the black-haired man was clapping a hand to his head, eyes screwed shut and hissing in pain.

The crowd was buffeting them again, pushing them further away from clear streets and safety. Their window of opportunity to make a break for it and escape was withering away.

Helga Hafela-pyf charged.

"That was amazing!"

"Shut up an' run, Godric!"

"But did you see the way she-listen, have you ever played at ball?"

"Later, Godric!"

The four of them were running for their lives, hurtling uphill and west along the streets of Lundenwic.

"We will never be able to outrun these people. We need to seek refuge somewhere!" The Lady shouted.

The big, mane-haired man – Godric, apparently – scowled at that, but seemed to reluctantly agree.

"We can go to the cathedral of St. Paul, it's very close by."

"No, Godric."

Godric glared at his friend.

"Are you just trying to disagree with everything I say?"

"...no."

"Arggh!"

"Come on, St. Paul's is too close an' popular. That's the first place they'll look for us."

"Well, where do you suggest, then?" snapped the Lady.

"St. Bride's is a little further but it's much smaller. We oughtta be able to defend it with only four."

Helga looked around, ignoring their bickering; as the hill steepened, they were passing an enormous building and churchyard that she could only assume was the cathedral they spoke of.

The Lady spoke up again, frowning.

"How do you know where-" she was interrupted by an arrow, shooting down over the nearest roof and landing among their feet.

They all stared at it for a moment. Mobs don't shoot arrows, after all, but soldiers do.

More soon followed in a deadly hail; the Lady and Godric raised a shield above their heads and they continued running without a word of argument.

Having crossed the River Fleet, they were now quickly approaching St. Bride's church, a square little building built with blocks of sandy stone. The distant noise of the mob was quickly growing into a roar as the four of them skidded into the churchyard; Godric immediately ran to try the door while the Lady turned to face her shield toward the mocelas.

Helga, looking frantically around the churchyard for anything that would help them break down the door, was stunned to see the black-haired man doing...nothing.

He was standing still by the north-eastern corner of the yard, facing away from the road and the mob.

"What are you doing? Help me find something to force the door!"

But he took no notice of her, and when she ran around to his front and shook him, his eyes flew open in surprise, like he had been in a trance.

To her shock he seized her shoulders in return.

"D'you hear that?" he asked her, eyes wide. She didn't think he was only looking at her.

"What are you talking about?! Have you-"

But he didn't even appear to hear her question, dropping her shoulders and bolting around the corner of the church, out of sight.

She turned in consternation to the church, where Godric was making significant progress against the door.

The priests of London, acutely aware of the power of magic, had made the characteristic priestly decision to protect their churches from wiccas with the same magic they possessed, outwardly condemning it to the masses while using it themselves in secret.

But the priests of London were not themselves wiccas, and the estranged protections placed on the church were slowly buckling under Godric's repeated blasts against them.

The Lady, having witnessed that exchange, was just opening her mouth to shout to Godric that his friend had either gone mad or abandoned them when the black-haired man skidded back around the corner.

"Leave the door, Godric!" he shouted.

When they all just turned and looked at him like he had lost his mind, he gestured in the direction of the mob, barely a quarter mile distant now.

"Come on! I found a place we can hide for now that the mocelas can't get to!"

Shrugging, Godric left the half-splintered door and jogged around the corner of the church after his friend.

Helga and the Lady looked at each other.

After a moment, Helga turned to follow them. After all, the strange pair hadn't let them down yet; that was good enough for her.

When she turned the corner to the south-eastern section of the yard, she saw for herself what the black-haired man had discovered.

A small holy well sat innocuously by the church's boundary well, identical to any of the dozens of such wells in Lundenwic. Less normal was the set of rough-hewn stone steps at the well's base, leading northward down into a dark passageway that sloped and disappeared beneath the ground.

The black-haired man had already jogged halfway down the steps, gesturing at them to follow. Godric was right behind him, lighting his wand as he went.

Helga moved forward with every intention of following the two men, but the Lady grabbed her by the arm.

"Wait!" she said harshly. Her face had paled in the late morning light, nearly to the color of the snow coating the ground around them.

Godric paused on the steps and the second man popped his head back up over the wall of the stairway, quirking an eyebrow.

"Whatever is the matter?" Godric asked her, face open and concerned.

"This is insane. You and your thrall-you're just going to lead us into this mysterious underground passageway, with no care for the potential dangers? I-we don't even know you! How can we trust you?"

Helga kept from frowning only because of long practice; she doubted the Lady even noticed how she had started talking in the plural without thinking to ask what Helga's opinion on the matter actually was. But this wasn't new to her, and by the way the black-haired man rolled his eyes at the Lady's outburst behind her back he had picked up on it too.

He leaned on the stone wall, insouciant despite the growing roar of the crowd not two streets away now.

"Well, you could come with us an' risk the tunnel despite your lack of...trust. Or you could stay here an' negotiate with the horde of English mocelas who will be here in less than two minutes, bayin' for our blood, an' who have special reason to hate Danes." he shrugged with a glint in his eye. It seemed to Helga that he was trying not to laugh – but at what, she didn't know.

After this declaration, he winked at Helga and disappeared into the darkness beneath the well.

Godric, however, seemingly unwilling to leave anyone to a fate of mob justice, came further back up the steps, extinguishing his wand, and started to speak.

"My lady, I-"

At that moment the front of the mob spilled into a neighboring street, within view of the church, and the Lady seemed to reach a decision – despite her clear reluctance to enter the tunnel, she took a deep breath and practically flew past Godric down the steps.

Helga, painfully relieved that that had been resolved, hurried herself down the steps after them, noting curiously as she went that a rough little carving of a snake was inscribed on the lintel of the stone doorway framing the tunnel. It seemed an odd thing to find in a Christian churchyard, but then again there was much in this country that she found odd, and so she thought nothing more of it.

She heard Godric jump down the last few stairs behind her; as he did so, the entrance to the churchyard seemed to almost melt away, closing up until the four of them stood together in absolute darkness.