Nottingham 867
The chapel was small and quiet. Not at all like the large buildings of the church they had in Canterberry. Robyn liked the small chapel with its simple wooden benches and humble unornamented alter. It reminded him that the work of Christ was a work of grace and not an act of pompous clergy. He stood in the doorway at the back of the chapel. His longbow slung over his shoulder, his quiver of arrows hung from the other shoulder and he waited. It didn't take but a few minutes for the clergyman to enter the chapel from the door behind the altar. He was young, of not more than twenty six years of age, the same age as Robyn. And the clergyman was fit and muscular as any man of his age. The robed man stopped short at the sight of Robyn.
"Tuck!" Robyn cried out, a huge grin spread across his face.
"Robyn…they told me you were dead," the man broke into a smile of his own as he approached Robyn with disbelief. "But praise be to God, you are alive!"
"I am indeed," Robyn clasped Tuck into a bear hug. "No number of Danes could keep me from returning to my favorite cousin."
Tuck pulled away from him after a moment and surveyed Robyn. "You have a new scar," he observed of the scar on Robyn's eyebrow.
"Tis fair enough since the Dane who gave it to me no longer has life." Robyn replied, still in good spirits. "And look at you cousin, you've gotten stronger."
Tuck shrugged almost bashfully. "The Bishop tasked me with brewing ale for the Monastery. Seems all I do is carry barrels of ale into the cart and out of the cart and up the stairs and down the stairs. I don't mind much. Any task in the service of Christ is a worthy task."
"I don't suppose you get to drink this ale?" Robyn asked, only half in jest.
"Oh yes. As much of it as I like on the condition that the people of the parish never see me drunk."
"Then you'll share with your favorite cousin!" Robyn clapped him on the shoulder with a laugh.
"Of course. This way," Tuck led the way out the door behind the altar down a set of narrow stairs into a cellar filled with barrels and brewing equipment. Tuck found three mugs and dipped a pitcher into an open barrel. He passed one mug to Robyn and kept two for himself. "And how fares our Lord King Edmund?"
"The same as always," Robyn said evasively as he drank.
"That tells me nothing. You are the one who knows him. You're a member of his household guard. The Captain of his household guard. You see him every day and yet you always refuse to speak about him. Why is that? Is he an evil man?"
"No," Robyn said bitterly. "He is not an evil man. He is quite the opposite. He is the most godly man I have ever met."
Tuck became somber at those words. "You fear you will never be worthy of serving him."
Robyn made no reply and instead downed his mug of ale. "How is Aunt Lizbeth? I trust she is well?"
"My mother is fine. Everyone in the village had a terrible cough and she avoided catching the sickness at all and instead brought healing herbs to the sick. She was blessed by God."
"Indeed," Robyn agreed.
The pair of them sat drinking and catching up on the local news well into the evening until the both of them fell fast asleep with an empty ale mug in their hands.
Gisburn 867
The Danes had come too quickly to defeat their invasion to his lands. They surrounded Guy's meager fortress in the dead of night. Guy stood on the wall of castle overlooking the heathen troops with their torches and shields and spears and found that he was unsure of what to do next. The castle could not hold them out. It wasn't really a castle but merely a walled courtyard surrounding peasant cottages and his own stone house. The walls were made of stone near the gates but in other areas were made of mud or wood and sometimes the wood was only standing sticks in rows. Guy was not a wealthy enough Earlman to repair the walls as they should be. By morning the Danes would learn of the weaknesses in the walls and his village and his people, all two hundred and eighteen of them, would suffer great violence or death.
"Danes!" he called down to them. "I am Guy of Gisburn. Which of you is the leader? I wish to speak of peace!"
A single Dane stepped out from the heathen troops. "I am Ragnar Lodbrok. There is to be no peace. Today there will be only Victory or Valhalla!" he shouted. His words were followed by a chorus of cheers from his men.
"Yes, you will have victory," Guy called down to them. "Of that much I am sure. But is your choice if this victory will be gained at the cost of some of your men's lives or none of them."
"My men have no fear of death," Ragnar called back. "Your words are a coward's words."
"I do not fear death for myself. If you wish to execute me and give my people their freedom I would accept those terms. What price can I pay that my people may escape with their lives and I will pay it?" Guy knew he did not have the wealth that they probably wanted but perhaps he could make them believe he did if only it gave them time to escape some other way, any other way.
Ragnar scratched his long braided beard as he thought about Guy's offer. "You have ale and and livestock and spears?" he called out.
"I have all of those things my lord!" Guy shouted in return. "Some seventy eight barrels of ale and a few hundred spears and sheep!"
"We will take them all, and your lands and you Guy of Gisburn will come down here and renounce your Christian God and swear yourself to my service!"
Deny Christ? Guy did not like this offer. He was not a pious man and never had been but people expected certain things of a Lord. This would destroy his reputation but it would save lives and perhaps that would be worthwhile in the end. "I have your oath that my people will be allowed to remain here unharmed?" he asked, knowing how the Danes felt about oaths. If Ragnar promised it, the thing would be as good as done.
"I will do as you ask, Ragnar of Lodbrok," And Guy of Gisburn took the path to the gate to go out and meet the Danes.
At Sea 867
The chains rankled raw on Maerinn's wrists and ankles. Her companions in the belly of the ship fared no better than she did. She had hoped that the ship would be an improvement after months in a cage in Dublin waiting to be taken to the slave market and sold to Arabs. The cage had been full of Irish women like herself. Some were only children, barely women at all. The men who kept them had barely fed them and at times had removed one or two women from the cages to take to their own beds to meet their more beastal needs. The first time a Viking had selected her to be his companion she had put up a fight, and lost. Ivar the Boneless had been too strong for her. He had however, been amused by her spite and had selected her three more times before it came time to board the ships and go to market. The ship was not the improvement she had hoped for. The slaves sat in crowded conditions with the oarsmen. Ivar barked orders on the deck above.
Exhaustion borne of hunger caused Maerinn to drift in and out of sleep for days. Days melted into weeks until Ivar was standing over her unlocking her chains.
"We've reached land. I'm going to meet my brother Ragnar Lodbrok and help him take the Anglo towns. You'll go with me. You're mine now." He unlocked the last of the chains, took her arms and hauled her to her feet.
"But what about Dedre and Kaela?" she asked, barely able to stand but still worried about the women who had become her friends.
"They will be sold to some other heathen I suppose," Ivar said, yanking her closer to himself. She stumbled forward and landed against his chest. He grinned. "You were sold to me. We go to find my brother now. You will behave or you will be sorry for it."
She nodded, too weak to respond further. Ivar picked her up and carried her out of the ship. He waded along the shore onto dry land. A band of men, Viking men, waited for him there. Ivar dropped her carelessly on the beach and hugged one of the men.
Maerinn only understood bits of their language. She had learned much of it over recent months but some words were still unknown to her. She heard enough to know that they were to be traveling to the home of some Anglo coward. It was a home that they had taken some months earlier. They would go there, regroup, and begin to take more cities.
"You have brought a most beautiful slave with you, brother," Ragnar said, his attention turned to Maerinn on the ground. "She must have cost many coins."
"Eh, not so many," Ivar replied. "She is beautiful but they say she can not bear children. That is what her husband said when he sold her to the trader. She is wasted as a concubine to bear children on."
"But not wasted as a companion," Ragnar said, looking her over.
"No, not as that," Ivar agreed. He reached down a pulled Maerinn to her feet. "We have a long journey ahead. I will not carry you. Walk," he commanded, and Maerinn did her best to do as she was told.
Guy was not looking forward to the return of Ragnar and hosting his brother Ivar as a guest. The Danes had settled peacefully on his lands and his people had remained unharmed as promised but that did not mean that Guy welcomed their presence. He was thankful though that they remained unaware of his horde of coins that had been hidden since their takeover of his lands. He had been waiting for the right moment to take his coins and leave. He didn't know where he would go but there had to be somewhere, anywhere, that he could resume a peaceful life away from these heathens.
They came back to his lands before Guy could form a real plan on where to flee to. In truth they had been gone only hours and the idea of abandoning his people didn't sit well with him, so he had stayed in favor of waiting for a better time. The party of nine Danes rode into the open gates and several non Danes walked along behind them. They were all bound with ropes attached to the horses. They had to be slaves. Those godless heathens had brought five slaves back with them. Biting back his disgust, Guy went out of his house and into the courtyard to meet them.
"Guy of Gisburn!" Ragnar cheerfully jumped down from his horse. "I have brought back with me my brother, Ivar the Boneless! Is he not fearsome?"
"He is indeed fearsome, just as you have said my lord," Guy agreed, knowing it was what the Dane wanted to hear. "You have brought others as well?"
"Yes, you know these men. They left with me hours ago, or have you forgotten already?" Ragnar said.
"Of course…what I mean to say is, you have brought slaves…" he said uncomfortably. He wondered if these slaves had been plundered from his own neighbors, just Anglo-Saxon country peasants. The thought of it saddened him.
"We have! The three men will serve me and tend my horses and flocks. The big man there knows how to smith. And the woman, she will serve Ivar." Ragnar told him.
Guy tried not to stare at the lovely red haired woman. She was thin and dirty and looked rather terrified but somehow managed to stand tall and tried to hide her fear. Her eyes met his for a moment with a look of defiance. He understood, having wanted to defy his effectual captors many times in the past few months. There was nothing he could about his own state of affairs and even less he could do about hers.
"A feast has been prepared," he told them. "We anticipated your return and made a sacrifice to Odin. Come and eat."