be their companion, looked up at me and said: ‘Do you seek passage?’
I did not answer him but only looked to Brother Cadroc. His eyes would not meet mine, but now Aelfric shot me an angry stare, which in moments changed into a look of amusement; then he began to laugh as he whispered something to Cadroc. Now the monk turned to glare at me indignantly, but I must have looked like the proverbial lost lamb, as once more I received the impression that something within the man was uncertain and divided, for after a moment his anger subsided, and he appeared to relent.
‘Come then,’ he said, and shifted to make a space in the boat beside him. ‘For now, at least.’
‘Thank you, truly,’ I said to him as I climbed in, feeling a flood of incredible relief.
‘And I say truly that you should not thank me,’ he muttered. ‘You would be safer abandoned on the marsh, Brother.’
But I also turned to give Aelfric my thanks, for I felt his words to Cadroc had perhaps been instrumental in my acceptance into their company. In that moment I came to regard Aelfric as a friend.
As Alfhere rowed us over the lake, and I felt the sudden exhilaration of freedom and the cool wet breeze on my face, it came to me that by embarking on this voyage across the water I had passed over a boundary from which I could not turn back. Whatever might lie ahead, it had now become my fixed path into a strange and mysterious world of darkness and great danger. But I was convinced that here burned the fire that would temper my soul: a chance to serve as a companion and perhaps even an apprentice to an exorcist monk and learn the secret ways of battling with the Dark One. I prayed my courage would prove equal to the task. But then I thought of Ailisa, and I questioned whether what had prompted my actions was courage at all. I wondered if, in my coward’s heart, I might have run away anywhere to escape my responsibility to her, to place some distance between us and make our parting easier.
When we had crossed the lake, to the point where the beds of reeds grew too thick for the coracle to go further, we climbed ashore, and Aelfric said:
‘Now we must continue north. This will bring us to the settlement called Meretun where we will find welcome and lodging tonight.’
We walked for hours on snaking pathways across a series of small islets which rose and fell out of the marshes, following tracks over thin ridges of firm ground which formed a connection of narrow causeways between them, while gulls soared and cried above us. But all else was deathly quiet and still except for the wails and shrieks of the marsh birds which sometimes rose, like the unearthly sobbing of lost damned souls upon the sharp salt winds that blew in from the distant sea and merged with the pervading stench of rotting slime, which drifted everywhere in clouds of vapour from out of the oozing depths of the mud. At first Cadroc did not speak but only trudged onward as his eyes held a faraway look, which made it seem that as he travelled he simultaneously traversed some inward realm of his own, and I sensed how heavily the burden of his responsibility must lay upon him. Eventually I began to converse quietly with Aelfric as he strode in front and held his spear, pausing occasionally to test with the blunt end of its wooden shaft the firmness of the ground ahead, saying to him:
‘Are you not afraid to journey through the fens on the trail of this killer?’
He smiled and raised his spear with both hands as he answered.
‘I do not fear. The Fenland is my home. And life spent in fear is no life.’
‘But you must have confidence in Brother Cadroc’s powers. Are you a Christian man?’
‘I have made worship to the Christ-god,’ he said briefly. I understood his meaning. Most of the fen-men respected our faith, but to them the Christian god remained only one among many. As Cadroc had confided to me, it was by his mission here that he intended to change that situation. But
I did not answer him but only looked to Brother Cadroc. His eyes would not meet mine, but now Aelfric shot me an angry stare, which in moments changed into a look of amusement; then he began to laugh as he whispered something to Cadroc. Now the monk turned to glare at me indignantly, but I must have looked like the proverbial lost lamb, as once more I received the impression that something within the man was uncertain and divided, for after a moment his anger subsided, and he appeared to relent.
‘Come then,’ he said, and shifted to make a space in the boat beside him. ‘For now, at least.’
‘Thank you, truly,’ I said to him as I climbed in, feeling a flood of incredible relief.
‘And I say truly that you should not thank me,’ he muttered. ‘You would be safer abandoned on the marsh, Brother.’
But I also turned to give Aelfric my thanks, for I felt his words to Cadroc had perhaps been instrumental in my acceptance into their company. In that moment I came to regard Aelfric as a friend.
As Alfhere rowed us over the lake, and I felt the sudden exhilaration of freedom and the cool wet breeze on my face, it came to me that by embarking on this voyage across the water I had passed over a boundary from which I could not turn back. Whatever might lie ahead, it had now become my fixed path into a strange and mysterious world of darkness and great danger. But I was convinced that here burned the fire that would temper my soul: a chance to serve as a companion and perhaps even an apprentice to an exorcist monk and learn the secret ways of battling with the Dark One. I prayed my courage would prove equal to the task. But then I thought of Ailisa, and I questioned whether what had prompted my actions was courage at all. I wondered if, in my coward’s heart, I might have run away anywhere to escape my responsibility to her, to place some distance between us and make our parting easier.
When we had crossed the lake, to the point where the beds of reeds grew too thick for the coracle to go further, we climbed ashore, and Aelfric said:
‘Now we must continue north. This will bring us to the settlement called Meretun where we will find welcome and lodging tonight.’
We walked for hours on snaking pathways across a series of small islets which rose and fell out of the marshes, following tracks over thin ridges of firm ground which formed a connection of narrow causeways between them, while gulls soared and cried above us. But all else was deathly quiet and still except for the wails and shrieks of the marsh birds which sometimes rose, like the unearthly sobbing of lost damned souls upon the sharp salt winds that blew in from the distant sea and merged with the pervading stench of rotting slime, which drifted everywhere in clouds of vapour from out of the oozing depths of the mud. At first Cadroc did not speak but only trudged onward as his eyes held a faraway look, which made it seem that as he travelled he simultaneously traversed some inward realm of his own, and I sensed how heavily the burden of his responsibility must lay upon him. Eventually I began to converse quietly with Aelfric as he strode in front and held his spear, pausing occasionally to test with the blunt end of its wooden shaft the firmness of the ground ahead, saying to him:
‘Are you not afraid to journey through the fens on the trail of this killer?’
He smiled and raised his spear with both hands as he answered.
‘I do not fear. The Fenland is my home. And life spent in fear is no life.’
‘But you must have confidence in Brother Cadroc’s powers. Are you a Christian man?’
‘I have made worship to the Christ-god,’ he said briefly. I understood his meaning. Most of the fen-men respected our faith, but to them the Christian god remained only one among many. As Cadroc had confided to me, it was by his mission here that he intended to change that situation. But
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