It was a familiar dream.
He was standing out in the barren fields. His only companions were the wintry winds that moaned with all that which he could never put to words. Those unspoken agonies usually gnawed at him like beasts at the roots of an apple tree—above the earth, all sweet scents and blossom-laden boughs and the promise of something more; below the earth, a ruin.
“You bear your wound manfully and well,” Wrecca had said, “Pain may remain but a man must endure lest he loses all that makes him the man he is.” Alone on the plains with his burdens locked away, Alweard felt less like a rider bearing his and more like a caged bird watching wild geese fly free.
As he closed his eyes, he felt something tug at his chest. The rush of water filled his ears; a canopy of willow-fronds brushed his shoulders. When he opened his eyes, he was standing at the silvery bend of a river. It wasn’t the Isen; there were no raft-lined brown banks. No, these were the lush green willows of the Entwade. The shape of the riverbend spoke of home—or a place that had been home over twenty years ago. He had once been a child wading in the gentle current searching for stones beneath the glittering water. Though the river had been swollen by spring’s floods, it had not swept him away. It would not sweep him away now.
Alweard slipped off his shoes and padded down the riverbank. He knew it should have been winter, but the sun was warm and gentle; the water didn’t numb his toes as it would if it were cold. Splashing through the current like an errant child, he hardly noticed the water rise to his waist. All his attention was fixed on the far bank, where something shadowy moved past a curtain of willow boughs.
Emerging onto the other side of the river, Alweard wandered into a clearing between the trees. His steps grew heavy as his feet sank into the grass, yet his body trembled like a leaf, ready to fall at any moment. As he searched the sun-dappled ground, he found what he was looking for: a pit beneath the shade of an old willow tree. To another man, it might appear sepulchral; to him, it was as welcome as a warm bed after a long campaign.
Lowering himself into the pit, he laid down on his back. The sweet scent of humus and rot filled his nose, then his lungs. Black soil fell soft as snow over his head. His heartbeat, once fluttering fast from the labor of crossing the river, slowed; his warm hands grew cold. Closing his eyes, he let the earth embrace him.
Alweard awoke with a sharp gasp as if the air had been stolen from his lungs. The fire of Léofstan’s home crackled nearby. As the hearth-flames danced, they cast long shadows that twisted over the walls like snakes. Beneath one such snake, not half an arm-span’s distance from him, was the sleeping form of Wrecca. An odd sense of relief descended over Alweard at the familiar sound of his friend’s snoring.
Crawling out from a tangle of furs and blankets, he padded over the floor and snatched up his blank book. With its smooth leather cover and pages filled with brief, ciphered notes and sketches, it had been his constant companion on recent journeys. He turned the pages slowly, for any rustling might wake Wrecca from his slumber—though given the ease with which he escaped camp back in the winter, he doubted that the older man was a particularly light sleeper.
After many slow and agonizing turns of the page, he came to a blank sheet of parchment and stifled a sigh of relief. With a cautious swish of his quill, he jotted down the date in the Stewards’ Reckoning. As he wrote, elf-letters curled dark as smoke across the page:
Súlimë 8:
All has been quiet in the nights since I first sheltered with Léofstan (Léofric Thane’s second son) and his family. They are kind and warm; one could hardly ask for better hosts. Wrecca is here too. As always, he rests well for a man who bears his own guilt so stoically.
Sleep evades me still, but these winter nights have shown me one mercy by letting me keep my wits. Though the Dragon-clan warband has shown no sign of flagging morale, my mind always wanders back within these walls. The air is brisk and clear here, the water is not poisoned, and yet I still worry for Cwealmláf, though he should be safe under the healer Gwervel’s care.
Perhaps something is foul in the burh of Sedgebury.
