The current swirls around her ankles. She splashes through the river with Winter in tow, doing her best to ignore the icy water as it floods inside her shoes and seizes her toes. Instead she imagines the fire that they’ll soon have burning, and how good it will be to warm her feet beside it. And her hands, and her face. If she thinks hard enough she can almost feel the heat upon her cheeks. Small comforts.
She’s so lost in her thoughts that she almost collides with Merewyn, who’s stopped in front of her, in the middle of the river. Her lady cries out. Behind her, Beorn is shouting something she can’t make out.
‘What’s going on?’ she asks, just as she looks up and sees the figures standing in the middle of the path on the opposite bank. Two of them, blades glinting coldly in the twilight.
‘Quickly,’ Beorn is yelling. ‘Back the way we came! Now!’
Tova doesn’t question him, but does exactly as he says. She whirls to follow him, ready to scramble back up the bank, only to see their path blocked by another two figures, both with weapons drawn.
Their enemies have found them.
‘Well, well,’ comes a voice from the near bank. A man’s voice. Older. Thick with scorn and with spite. ‘What a happy turn of events this is. Look, it’s our old friend Guthred.’
And she knows. She doesn’t have to see his gap-toothed smile, his scarred face, his thick eyebrows, those large ears. Like serving dishes, the priest said.
It’s him. The murderer, the priest slayer, the killer of children, who has raided and thieved and cheated and preyed upon the weak, who has tortured monks without compunction.
‘Wulfnoth?’ Guthred says.
‘Did you think you could run from us? Did you think you could steal from us and we would just let you get away?’
‘You can’t have it,’ Guthred shouts back. ‘I won’t let you.’
Laughter. Not just from Wulfnoth but from the others too, on both sides of the river. Among them a woman’s voice. Gytha, she thinks. Who else did Guthred say was left by the end? She tries to remember but can’t gather her thoughts properly. One of the two brothers, she thinks, and the deaf one as well. Halfdan. Was that his name? Or was that Sihtric? She isn’t sure.
Beorn asks, ‘How did you find us?’
‘Providence,’ Wulfnoth says. He sounds pleased with himself. Tova can’t see, but she can imagine the grin on his face. ‘Or fate, or destiny; whatever you want to call it. God willed it, and so it happened. He delivered you to us.’
‘He’d never help you,’ the priest shouts. ‘You’re Hell fiends, all of you.’
‘Oh Guthred, you pious fool. You never were one for jokes, were you? No, of course it wasn’t God’s doing. We’ve been watching you. Watching and following, waiting to see what you and your new friends would do. And now here we are. And here you are. What happened to the other one who was with you?’
‘You can have the gold and silver,’ says Beorn flatly, ignoring his question. ‘The book too. Everything. We don’t need it. It’s yours.’
‘No, it isn’t,’ Guthred blurts. ‘It doesn’t belong—’
‘Shut up.’ Beorn turns to Wulfnoth. ‘You can have it, if you’ll leave us in peace to go on our way. No one needs to get hurt.’
He extends his hand towards the priest, gesturing for him to give the treasure over, but Guthred shakes his head. ‘You’ll have to pry it from my dead fingers,’ he calls to Wulfnoth.
‘Priest,’ Beorn says warningly. ‘Do you really want to get yourself killed for the sake of a book?’
‘Listen to him, Father,’ Merewyn says. ‘Think about it. If you die then you won’t be able to atone, will you?’
‘Atone?’ Wulfnoth asks, laughing. ‘Do you really think the Lord will forgive you after everything you’ve done?’
Just do it, Tova implores silently. Please, for our sakes, just let him have what he wants. God will understand, won’t he?
Beorn gestures towards Guthred. The priest hesitates before reluctantly passing the strap of the scrip over his head and handing it to him. Beorn tosses it across to the bank where Wulfnoth and his friend are standing. It lands with a dull thud and a clatter of metal.
‘There,’ he says. ‘You have what you came for.’
Wulfnoth picks it up and loosens the drawstring. He casts a brief look inside before letting it fall at his feet. ‘Not yet.’
‘What?’ Beorn glances at Guthred. ‘It’s all there, isn’t it?’
Wulfnoth gives a snort. ‘Do you think we’ve ridden all this way just to take back a few shiny trinkets and a worthless bundle of parchment? We want Guthred. Hand him over to us and then you can go.’
‘Guthred?’ Tova asks. ‘Why?’
‘He knows why,’ shouts the woman, Gytha, from the other bank. She stands under the trees, in shadow, all but hidden. ‘He betrayed us. We trusted him and he betrayed that trust. He stole from us.’
‘You crossed me, Guthred,’ Wulfnoth says. ‘You crossed me twice. You made my life a misery. You took everything from me. But you can’t run any longer.’
He takes a step forward, then another. He walks with a limp, but at the same time with an air of confidence, as if he has mastery of the world and everything in it, and there is nothing that frightens him.