The Saxon Spears Read online

  It was then that I saw Father Paulinus for the first time. He stood by the makeshift altar at the end of the painted hall, wearing a snow-white mantle and a headgear of a single beam of silver protruding from his head; he held a silver cup in one hand and a piece of wheat bread in the other. The candles behind him produced a bright halo around his head. At that moment, things becoming muddled and confused in my mind, I concluded it was he who was the God in the slab, the one the old woman was praying to. I raised my arms and cried out the words of the prayer as loud as my tiny throat could muster, aiming them at the man — the angel — at the altar. The congregation fell silent. They all stared at me, but for once, it didn’t matter: Father Paulinus had noticed me and smiled, and for a moment, all was right with the world.

  Neither my prayers, nor the woman’s helped to avert the disaster that irrevocably transformed my life.

  At the age of six, I was deemed strong and reliable enough to accompany the old man to the bath house. Sweeping the detritus of the bathers with a small willow broom, I had plenty of time to contemplate my predicament, as much as a six-year-old could. In comparison to the mud hut we lived in, the bath house seemed a dwelling of the giants, with its three separate halls, high-swept arched ceiling and high, bright windows shooting pillars of light onto the heated floor, its surface covered in thousands of tiny polished square pebbles.

  The Loudborne was the only bath we could count on, freezing cold even in the height of summer. At least the old man was able to pick up scraps of real soap and drips of unused olive oil the guests left behind, and so we didn’t have to scrub ourselves with just sand and ash like the rest of the slaves. And since I didn’t know any better, I had no reason to complain; things were as they were.

  But something stirred inside me as I stared at that vaulted ceiling. The bath house wasn’t even the grandest building in the villa. That title belonged to the Master’s home, the domus, looming over all of us like a mountain — or so it seemed to the tiny me at the time. From a distance, it was a solid, two-storey block of whitewashed stone and red tile, but closer approach — something I only dared to do during the confusion of religious ceremonies — revealed that the walls were covered in intricate paintings and carvings, scenes of merry rural life, farm work and others that I had no chance to comprehend. Several stone statues of beautiful men and women adorned the porch, all cracked and stained with age. A round stone bowl stood in front of the main entrance, with an iron pipe sticking in the middle; it was meticulously carved into fantastic shapes of fish and more mystifying, nameless creatures. Twin rows of tall, straight trees, unlike any in the surrounding woods, lined the broad avenue leading towards the gates. It was all so unlike any other building on the property that it appeared to have been transported from another world; perhaps, I mused, from the Heavens by Father Paulinus himself.

  As weeks passed, I had grown overcome with the desire to leave my mud hut and live among the people in the whitewashed house. I had no plan to achieve it, other than seek to improve myself, grow as strong and useful as my namesake tree, and perhaps in that way make the Master and his wife notice me again, just as they’d noticed me in that slave market.

  Once in a while, I’d spot Lady Adelheid passing by our home, seemingly by accident, since there was no reason for her to be there: the main entrance to the bath house was on the opposite side of the building, and there was nothing but weeds and a murky, stinking pool of reeds beyond the mud hut. She’d glance at me with an unfathomable expression from under the brown veil she always wore, and then quickly disappear, before I could reach out to her. I desperately tried to understand what it meant, how I could make her stop and speak to me, and it only made me more eager to prove myself worthy of her attention.

  I soon realised that even if I became the finest floor-sweeper in the world, it would never be enough to fulfil my ambitions. As far as I was concerned, the folk from the whitewashed house were equal to gods, not least Father Paulinus, in his eternally snow-white mantle. What I needed was something only the gods could give me — a miracle. At last, I knew what to pray for.

  By far the most profitable part of the old man’s job was cleaning the hypocaust: the complex system of underfloor spaces, divided with brick pillars, through which the heated air spread under the stone floors of the bath house. Anything small enough to fall through the cracks in the floor ended up down here, and at the end of the day we’d comb through the narrow darkness with small oil lamps in search of anything worth picking up. We had to present our finds to the chief attendant, a grim, dark-skinned fellow, who exceeded the old man by several ranks in the slave hierarchy. Anything deemed refuse we could keep: scraps of cloth, bits of bone, random pieces of metal. The old man knew how to use these to mend things around the house, or to trade them for more useful supplies with the craftsmen employed at the villa. If the item proved to be truly valuable, like a piece of jewellery or a coin, there was a chance of a small reward, depending on the item’s worth.

  The old man soon learned that my small form made me more suitable to sneaking between the brick pillars than himself. It took me only a couple of months to learn how to find my way about the hypocaust and to tell bits of brick and dust from real treasure, and from then on, I was sent out on the clean-up missions almost every week, usually in the mornings, before the hypocaust furnace heated up for the first time.

  On that fateful day, I was scrubbing my way back along the flue pipes near the furnace gate, a heavy bronze hatch used to regulate the flow of the hot air. It was a particularly poor haul day: just a few scraps of discarded cloth and a broken bronze scraper. I was about to make one final turn before joining the old man — waiting for me at the door to pick up the plunder — when I spotted something glinting bright in the dark nook between two loose bricks of a pillar.

  I reached in, but it was stuck for good, and I couldn’t get enough purchase to pull it away. It was remarkable that something so large could have got lost through the cracks. I was certain it must have belonged to Lady Adelheid. The reward would be substantial, but more importantly, I might be able to present the find to the good Lady myself, and get noticed that way. But first, I had to somehow get it out…

  “What’s taking you so long down there?” the old man shouted. “They’ve lit up the furnace!”

  He didn’t have to tell me. The bronze hatch was already too hot to touch, and steam whistled through the flues in the wall. I needed to hurry, but the strange object wouldn’t budge.

  “I found something,” I replied. “But I can’t get it out.”

  “Leave it, boy. It’s probably nothing.”

  “It’s shiny!” I said. “And large.”

  “Shiny?” That piqued his interest. “What colour?”

  “Eh… yellow, like the inside of a buttercup.”

  He shouted a word I hadn’t heard before, and which I’d later learn meant gold. With surprising swiftness, he appeared beside me and pushed me away from the pillar. I protested, but one strong smack over the head silenced my objections. A strange grimace twisted the old man’s face. He heaved more than I’d ever seen him before. He snarled at me and then leaned between the pillars to dislodge the elusive jewel.

  He made one final strong pull… The item snapped loose, and with it, several bricks came flying down. The old man fell on his back, clutching the jewel in his hand. The brick pillars collapsed, pinning him to the floor. I rushed to help, but the more I disturbed the pile, the more bricks dropped onto him.

  “You’re too weak. Go get help, boy!”

  I crawled a step back, and stopped.

  “What are you doing? Hurry, before it gets too hot in here!”

  My eyes were transfixed on the glimmering jewel in his hand. He noticed it too and scowled.

  “What is it? You want it too? Get help and I’ll let you hold it.”

  “No. Give me now.”

  I grabbed at the jewel and struggled with as much strength as I could muster. His hands were slippery with
sweat. He frowned and, seeing he wasn’t getting rid of me, at last let it go. I almost fell myself, but I scrambled up and rushed for the door. I heard his shouts turn into screams as I closed the door behind me.

  I waited. I was the only one who could hear him scream — the slaves at the furnace heard nothing over the noise of the flames. He was dying a long time, and must have suffered unspeakable agony. The steam in the hypocaust never got hot enough to kill a man quickly — rather, he suffocated as his lungs slowly burned out. All this time I stood by the door, making sure nobody was coming to help him, the golden jewel clutched tight in my six-year-old hand.

  Again, I’m not sure if that’s exactly what happened. Maybe I was too scared to call for help. Maybe the old man was already dead when I left him, crushed by the falling bricks. Was really my first deliberate, conscious act — a cold-blooded murder? Or was it just another memory I made up from bits and pieces of lost time?

  When they eventually found his body, it was dark and shrivelled like a raisin. Nobody questioned me — nobody even knew I used to help at the hypocaust. We buried him at the cemetery across the river, next to all the other slaves and serfs who died in Master’s service. Father Paulinus himself came down to say a short prayer for the old man’s departed spirit. A small mound and a cross of two birch sticks marked the grave.

  The old woman wailed and wept and tore her hair out, and I briefly felt sorry for her, but I had to take care of myself, so the day after the funeral I took the golden jewel and sneaked out to find Lady Adelheid.

  A two-horse, four-wheeled carriage — the sort that had taken me from the slave market to the villa — waited at the courtyard of the main house. I hid under a mulberry bush. The Master was already inside, but his wife was standing on the porch stairs, talking to a tall, blond bodyguard, armed with a great axe. Her fingers touched the cloth at her left breast, as if searching for something — the missing golden jewel, I guessed. I could wait no longer. I sprang out from under the bush, beat the courtyard sand with my bare feet, lunged under the spears of the guards, and dropped to my knees.

  I felt the touch of cold steel across my neck. Trembling, I presented my find on outstretched hands. The Lady gasped and waved the bodyguard away. She crouched to pick the jewel up.

  “My la… Lady.” My voice broke. I was ashamed of the way I spoke, so rough and primitive compared to the smooth, flowery tongue of the people of the villa. But I knew I would not get another chance for a long time — if ever.

  “Please, let me live with you in the domus.”

  With a sudden cry, she threw her arms around me and wept. As she sobbed, I raised my head to Heaven and smiled.

  CHAPTER II

  THE LAY OF PAULINUS

  I hear them call for me, so I splash my face with cold water one last time and stand up. I hide the rune stone under the tunic and head for the game field, a vast, flat rectangle of trampled yellow grass, spreading between the Loudborne and the villa’s main compound. In spring and autumn it’s a pasture for a couple of dairy cows, but in summer the beasts move to the shadowed banks of the river, where the grass is still green. The noises of battling youths replace their pensive mooing.

  I’m in no hurry. I know they will wait for me before starting their game. The teams must be equal in number — we’ve all been taught fairness is the proper, Roman way — and there are always fourteen of us wanting to take part in the battle. By the time I enter, each team already has six players selected. There’s only one boy left standing in the middle, looking forlorn.

  “I’ll take Ash!” cries out the captain of the western team as soon as I appear over the raised ridge bounding the game field from the south. His name is Gleva, and he’s the son of the villa’s master butcher.

  “No fair!” protests the other captain. “You Saxons always get him, and you always win!”

  “Well, he can hardly play a legionnaire,” replies Gleva and points at my golden hair with a shrug.

  We’re playing “A Battle on the Saxon Shore”; and it’s true, I always get selected to the team of the vicious fair-haired sea pirates, invading a fortress manned by Roman soldiers. Gleva himself sports an unruly, straw-coloured mane, a mark of some Saxon blood mixed with Briton in his veins. But the other five have brown or black hair and dark eyes, so the argument doesn’t hold. Nevertheless, Gleva is the tallest and strongest of us all — though not the oldest — and his word is final. The captain of the Romans gives up and waves with resignation at the lonely boy.

  “Fine. Master Fastid, if you please.”

  The boy raises his head and shuffles over, trying his best to look eager. His full name is Fastidius, but nobody bothers to pronounce all of it. Only the nobles living in the domus have the time to use names that long. I feel pity both for him and for the captain of his team. Fastidius doesn’t care for victory, he’s only here because he likes to spend time with the other children whenever he can — and it doesn’t happen too often.

  Fastidius is the closest I have to a brother. He is Master Pascent’s only child — the only child he and his wife would ever have. The difficulty of his birth had rendered Lady Adelheid barren. He is weak of health and frail of frame, shorter and lighter even than Eadgith, the bladesmith’s daughter, the only girl we allow in our games. But his intellect towers over any of us. He spends most of his days studying under Father Paulinus. They say he himself might one day become a priest. I respect him for it: he can already read entire books, while I barely know enough letters to decipher the sign above the villa’s entrance: ARIMINVM. But intellect alone is of no use in battle — at least not one as chaotic as the one about to erupt at the game field.

  Gleva hands me my weapon — an aspen stick about a foot long — and the shield, goat hide stitched to a round wicker frame. One side of the stick had its bark removed, to show where the blade would be on a real Saxon sword. Our opponents are armed with longer sticks, stripped of bark on both sides, and massive oval shields, unwieldy but strong, reinforced with lime wood boards. The shields make even Fastidius — I see he’s discussing something with his captain, agitatedly — look suitably impressive, but then, they represent the valiant Legions of the Empire, the finest fighting force in the world… or so we’ve been taught to believe.

  The wall of their “fortress” is marked with sacks of sand. We, the Saxons, are only allowed to charge through one of the three openings in the “wall”, since the pirates in the stories never used siege weapons. There’s no place for tactics here — strength of arms will be enough to resolve the conflict, and there’s a lot more of it on our side of the field. Apart from me and Gleva there’s Fat Banna and Big Sulio, who work in the domus kitchen; Map, the master carpenter’s oldest; Waerla, the pig shepherd, and Vatto, the gardener’s hand. Each of us is larger and stronger than any of the “Romans” facing us across the rectangle of dried grass.

  We all sense this isn’t as it should be. We know the history of this conflict, from the stories told by our elders: the Legions successfully defended the coast for centuries, until one day, for reasons none of us, except perhaps Fastidius, understands, the Roman soldiers left. But as long as they manned the forts, the pirates never stood a chance of penetrating inland. And yet in our pretend battles, we, the “Saxons”, win almost every time. There’s something ominous about it all, but I have no time to ponder. Gleva orders us forward.

  I let out a wild yell, raise the aspen sword over my head and charge across the field.

  I reach the line of sacks ahead of the others. The middle “gate” is manned by three boys, one of them Fastidius. I wave my stick, trying to hit the enemy over their big shields. Gleva and Map arrive at my side, and together we start to push the Romans away from the wall.

  They pull back as one. I lose my footing and fall. I roll on my back and raise the goats-hide shield just in time to block a stick heading for my head. I notice Map stumble too, and Fastidius somehow manages to land a blow at one of his vital zones. The rules are clear: Map needs to drop dow
n and remain “dead” for the rest of the battle, with a disappointed scowl on his face.

  Gleva throws away his weapon, grabs Fastidius’s shield with both hands and wrestles it from him with brute force. Defenceless, Fastidius flees. But his remaining two companions hold the line, as they pull back, step by step. Something feels off. By now, the battle should turn into a mess of individual duels, with us bashing each other over the heads. I glance around. In each of the corners, one Roman holds his ground, miraculously, against two of our men. The other two are running at us from both sides, holding only their shields.

  I throw mine away, grab the stick in both hands and strike at the enemy before me. Gleva tries to outflank them, but they are deft with their shields and, for a while, neither of us can land a hit. The two runners reach us and push at us. Now the boys in the front push too. I don’t know how it happened, but suddenly we’re trapped between four wooden boards, unable to swing our sticks.

  Gleva roars in rage. He grabs one of the shields, trying to do what he did earlier with Fastidius. But this shield belongs to the Roman captain, and he’s not giving up that easily. Gleva cries out in surprise and pain. We both look down. A stick appears underneath the raised shields. It strikes Gleva’s legs again.

  “Drop dead!” demands the Roman captain. “You’ve been hit!”

  “There’s no space!” replies Gleva.

  The Romans push back a little, allowing him to lie down on the grass. I wait my turn — it wouldn’t be honourable to take advantage of this pause in fighting. When everyone returns to their positions, so does the mysterious stick jabbing at my legs. I jump and cut a little jig trying to avoid it. One of the Roman boys laughs. I look up: it’s not a boy, it’s Eadgith, her sea-green eyes tearing up with laughter. I blush, embarrassed. Just then, the stick strikes my ankle. I trip, and the others bash at me with their shields until I cry “Enough! I’m dead!”