‘But the world didn’t end,’ Tova says irritably. She shouldn’t need to point that out to him.
‘No,’ Guthred admits. ‘No, it didn’t. We were spared. But now I see those same things happening again, and I fear that everything the archbishop foresaw all those years ago may finally be happening. I didn’t say it earlier, because your friend Beorn was mocking me, but that’s the other reason I feel I must make the pilgrimage to Lindisfarena as soon as I can, because there may never be another chance. Each day that passes is bringing us closer to the end. Each day that passes may be the last.’
Tova stares at him. ‘You don’t really believe that, do you?’
He nods sadly. ‘I do, child. Believe one who has lived long enough to see all the cruelties this world can bring to bear. I’ve seen drought and hunger, floods and sickness: so much misery, and every year it only grows worse. Everything is falling into ruin. It has been so for a long time, though we’ve become blind to it. Everything that we see happening around us now, this is the last chapter. Soon the book will close and we must prepare our souls for when it does.’
The book, Tova thinks. That’s it. She’s been desperate to find a different subject; she can’t take all this doomsaying. If she doesn’t divert him from this path, he will start talking about seas boiling and skies burning, and she isn’t sure she’ll be able to remain patient with him if he does.
She asks, ‘Does Wulfnoth know how much the book is worth?’
‘Wulfnoth?’ he echoes, sounding confused. She’s caught him off guard, broken his line of thought at last. ‘I should think he does. He must have some idea. Maybe only in the sense of gold and precious stones and how much he might sell it for. To him, that’s all it would mean. But he would know, yes. And there’s the rest of the loot too, of course.’
‘He won’t try to come after it, will he?’
Guthred wrings his hands. ‘I don’t know. But it’s been five days already. I’d have thought if he was coming for it, he’d have caught up with me by now.’
She supposes it depends just how desperate he is. What if he feels he has nothing more to lose?
Third Day
Hard, icy, sharp. It strikes her cheek. And again. And again.
Drowsily, Tova opens her eyes to unfamiliar walls. A place she doesn’t recognise. A bed not her own.
Where is she?
It comes back to her, of course, just as it did the day before. But she hates that helpless, panicked feeling. If every morning were to be like this from now on, she’d never want to sleep for fear of waking.
Another drop hits her face and rolls down the side of her nose. She wipes it away and, blinking, turns over to find herself staring at a circle of grey-white sky through a hole in the thatch.
Already it’s light. Time to be on their way.
*
They roll up their blankets and gather their things, then cover the ashes of the campfire with leaves and clumps of sodden turf, and lastly bury the horse dung using a rusted spade that Guthred found propped up against the back wall.
They have only four horses between the five of them, it turns out; Oslac came on foot. She has noticed how he keeps a watchful distance between himself and the animals. How he made sure to sleep at the other end of the barn from them too.
‘What happened to yours?’ Beorn asks him as they’re saddling up. ‘Did someone steal it?’
‘Nothing happened to it. I can’t ride. I don’t know how.’
‘You can’t ride?’ Tova asks, surprised, although perhaps she shouldn’t be. Most ordinary folk can’t. She couldn’t either, until Merewyn taught her, and only then because she wanted some female companionship when she went out riding.
‘I’m afraid of them,’ he says.
After a moment Merewyn laughs. It’s been a long time since Tova heard that sound. ‘You’re scared of horses?’
‘It probably sounds foolish to you—’
‘Are you telling us that you walk everywhere you go?’ Guthred asks. ‘You traipse from hall to hall on foot? Even in winter?’
‘Is it so difficult to believe?’ Oslac asks, red-faced.
‘I find it strange, that’s all.’
‘Well, that’s how it is. So don’t expect me to help feed them or brush them down or anything like that.’
Tova rubs Winter’s flank. ‘How can you be scared of such lovely creatures? What’s there to be frightened of?’
‘Everything. They’re too big. Too strong. I don’t like their eyes. You know the way they look at you sometimes, with the whites showing? You can’t tell what they’re thinking. You don’t know what they’re about to do next. I don’t trust them. I never have.’