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[jholloway.livejournal.com]

I chose a full moon to come back to Aspley. The roads are bad, and dark stands of trees shade the tracks. It has been a long time since I was here.

Aspley answers for 10 hides. Acard of Ivry holds from Hugh. Land for 12 ploughs. In Lordship 2 ploughs; a third possible.
16 villagers have 8 ploughs; ninth possible.
4 small holders and 5 slaves.
1 mill, 10s; meadow for 10 ploughs; woodland, 50 pigs.
Total value, £8; when acquired 100s; before 1066 £10.
Leofeva, commended to Earl Waltheof, held this manor; she could withdraw where she would with her land.

- Domesday Book

No one on any good business rides by night, but I am not concerned. Any robber would decide that a man of my size, in mail, with a sword, a dagger, and a long axe whose edge gleams like water in the moonlight is not his lawful prey. And there are no wolves in these woods; not any more.

Somehow I wish there were.

I remember the night we parted. I was as awed by her beauty after centuries as I had been the first night I met her; by the scent of her hair, the sound of her voice. I sat in the window and looked out at the lights of Dyrrachium below. I grew to a man without seeing a city this large -- this least of the Emperor's holdings. It was summer then, and there was a breeze. It stirred the silk of my robe. I saw the king in silk once, when I was at court. With her, I dwelt in a finer house than his, with a more beautiful woman. It was not enough for me.

These paths are not the paths I ran down as a boy, these meadows not the meadows where I learned to ride. She polished my clumsy Greek; she guided me through Plato, through Aristotle. I learned to ask questions I had never thought could need to be asked. These trees were saplings when last I was here. And yet are these not the same woods?

I chose the strongest and the bravest from among my men; I drank their blood from golden cups, and poured it over her body. I would not suffer her to paint my skin with it. To be covered with the blood of heroes is no novelty for me.

Bedfordshire sounds like Bedfordshire. Bedfordshire smells like Bedfordshire. I close my eyes and I might be a boy again; the steady movement of the horse under me, the weight of the sword I was learning to carry. By manhood the sword must be second nature.

The houses are denser now; the church taller, and built entirely of stone. In my father's time, only the tower was stone, and how proud we were of our bell-house. When first I saw the Holy Wisdom, I laughed for a solid minute. She scowled and said I was embarrassing her.

... the Varangians from Thule (by these I mean the axe-bearing barbarians) ... regard loyalty to the emperors and the protection of their persons as ... a kind of sacred trust and inheritance handed down from generation to generation; this allegiance they preserve inviolate and would never brook the slightest hint of betrayal.

- Anna Komnena, Alexiad

In the heat, the cloud of dust, I could have been in Sussex again; the line of horsemen coming at as, the pennants fluttering, the eyes of the horses rolling. They were a little different, those Normans, from the others, but similar enough that a growl went through the ranks -- I was not the only man who saw men like these take away his home and fortune. We hefted our axes and looked for the tallest man in the line, sword raised: Bohemond. Bohemond. Whoever killed him would be immortal.

The charge shattered on our line; spear-point, shield, axes crashing into the skulls of horses. The Franks jabbed with their lances, points screeching off helmets and heavy corselets as we ernt to work. That was how it should have been. This was how it should have been the first time. The axes converged on Bohemond, and he fell back, reining in his horse, and we were cheering, roaring our vengeance as the great blades sent mail rings flying from his bodyguards.

He was going for reinforcements, of course. Crossbowmen outflanked us. One man in two died. I was recovering from my wounds when she came to me, as if in a dream.


Swa ic modsefan
So I,
minne sceolde,
often wretched and sorrowful,
oft earmcearig,
bereft of my homeland,
eðle bidæled,
far from noble kinsmen,
freomægum feor
have had to bind in fetters
feterum sælan,
my inmost thoughts,
siþþan geara iu
Since long years ago
goldwine minne
I hid my lord
hrusan heolstre biwrah,
in the darkness of the earth,
ond ic hean þonan
and I, wretched, from there
wod wintercearig
travelled most sorrowfully
ofer waþema gebind
over the frozen waves,

- The Wanderer

I come to a halt in the centre of the village. There is a village now, a real one; it used to be no more than a little denser cluster of houses around the church. There are tiny flickers of light behind the shutters. Villagers have heard the horse arrive. They will not open their doors.

They will not open their doors to a stranger, at any rate. And not one armed and armoured. I could beat the doors down with one hand; I could tear the roof-beams up and smash the houses to kindling, and for a split second I want to do just that. I want to ruin the neat homes of those who live on the ruins of the houses of people I loved.

There was a girl once in this village, with a gap in her teeth and muddy blonde hair. To me, for a month or two one summer, she was the most beautiful thing in God's creation. Her granddaughters are long in their cold graves.

All the time I was away, it was as if I was separated from my England only by the waves of the sea. I could return if I wished. But in her arms and in her wars I passed a hundred and eighty-eight years, and as I did all that I knew and remembered sank into the earth, was ploughed under, and passed away.

I hear a hissed challenge from the church. It's in French.

I do not know why I am here.

So I turn the horse and ride away again.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_crimsonearth/]

<3 this.

And obscenely pleased about more Dark Ages fic.

[lslaw.livejournal.com]

You know, I suspect there is a niche market for modestly authentic historical vampire romance fiction that you could own if you set your mind to it.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

There is a HUGE market for historical vampire romance fiction. James should totally write something for it.

[akonken.livejournal.com]

You're so good.

[sotongeistooc.livejournal.com]

This is classy.

You had me at Varangian Guard.

[sl4irl.livejournal.com]

Likewise!

[castorlion.livejournal.com]

You seem to be enthused by dark ages at the moment, which is really nice to see. And I'm enjoying the fiction - you're good at it, and you come across to the layman (ie me) as knowing your stuff. It's authentic without being heavy or clunky, revealing just enough but not too much - it's a good read.