Free Conqueror by Stephen Baxter Page B

and watchful, saw something of this inner dialogue. ‘Think of the tales you will be able to tell!’
    Belisarius made an impulsive decision. ‘We will make this journey—’
    Macson tried to clench his fist in triumph, but winced as his burned claw refused to respond.
    ‘But,’ Belisarius said heavily, ‘not for three days.’
    ‘The law is the Germans’, not mine!’
    ‘If you are healing, if God’s grace is on you, we will travel on this exotic adventure of yours. If not - well, I will have lost nothing but a little time.’
    ‘You won’t regret it.’ Macson raised his hand. ‘I am confident this will heal, thanks to Roman medicine, if not God’s grace. One condition, though.’
    Belisarius, heading for the door, turned, amused. ‘Are you serious?’
    ‘My father comes too.’

VII
    Gudrid walked around the village, looking for the slave from Lindisfarena.
    Most of the houses, set back from the fjord’s shallow beach, were places of work: smithies, byres, barns. Stockades for the animals straggled up the hillside, as high as the grass could grow. But the big hall, thirty paces long and solidly constructed of squared and polished wood, was the centre of the community. Around its long hearth the endless winter evenings were passed in drink and talk, in play with the children, and in craft - sharpening blades, repairing clothes. The villagers were also proud of a small wooden building with stone-lined drains running under its walls. Here water was flung on burning logs to be turned to steam. Even in midwinter it got hot enough in there to make you sweat, and by day and night half-naked inhabitants crowded on its benches.
    Did the monks of Lindisfarena have a hall, or a sauna? What were the trees like on Lindisfarena, what was the local stone? She knew nothing of the island, or of Britain. She didn’t even know what a monk was for. She burned with curiosity.
    The slave had been put to work feeding the pigs. He had pails of bad meat and rotting vegetables which he was stirring with a long ladle. On his face was an expression of bored disgust.
    His name, she had learned, was Rhodri. He was small, black-haired, round-shouldered. He was seventeen or eighteen, a few years younger than herself. His features were regular, his jaw strong, his ears a little over-large. He might have been good-looking, she mused, in a brooding British way, if not for a sullen downturn to his full mouth.
    Rhodri became aware of Gudrid looking at him. He stopped work, leaned on his long ladle and stared back at her. His gaze, if sullen, was frank, almost defiant - and he stared speculatively at her body. She was faintly shocked; no slave had ever dared look at her that way before.
    She snapped, ‘You’ll not get those pigs fed at that rate ... Do you understand me?’
    ‘Yes,’ he said, his voice heavily accented. ‘You Germans have different tongues, but you all sound alike to me.’
    ‘We aren’t German. We are Norse. Or Viking. After our word Vik, which means “inlet”. We are the people of the fjords.’
    ‘Good for you.’ He yawned. ‘Anyway I picked up a bit of your tongue on the boat.’
    ‘My father’s boat.’
    He raised his eyebrows. ‘You’re Bjarni’s daughter? Which one - Gudrid, was it? He mentioned you.’
    ‘You aren’t telling me he talked to the likes of you.’
    ‘It’s a small boat. And I have big ears, even if I am just a slave.’
    She was growing angry at his easy insolence. ‘It’s a shame he didn’t teach you how to work.’
    ‘I am working,’ Rhodri interrupted, his voice now querulous. ‘Can’t you see?’ He rubbed his belly. ‘My gut’s still a knot from that boat. By Jesus’s wounds I puked myself half up.’
    She snorted. ‘You’ll recover.’
    He glanced at her, calculating now. ‘You’re the reason he went to Lindisfarena in the first place. You’ve got some kind of interest in it.’ Rhodri smirked. ‘A woman, interested in things. Your husband said it’s a shame