text: Aedwen sipped at the still-warm milk. Its creamy richness coated her mouth and throat. The flavour was comforting and she could feel her body relaxing in the glow of the hearth fire.
  
  Across from Aedwen, face lit from beneath by the flames, sat a girl not much older than her. When she had approached them in the milk shed, Aedwen had been terrified that the men who had murdered the residents of the farmstead had returned. Dunston had pushed himself forward, crowding the girl who had stepped from the gloom and Aedwen had thought how lucky the girl had been that he had not thought to carry his huge axe with him. He was as taut as a bowstring and Aedwen wondered whether he would have been able to prevent himself from killing the girl where she stood, if he had borne the weapon in his hand. As it was, he soon realised this was no killer striding from the dusk, rather a timid, slender and frightened young woman. Her hair was dark and her face had angular cheeks and a pointed chin that reminded Aedwen of a fox. Her skin was smeared with mud and grime.
  
  Nothgyth was her name and she said she was one of Beornmod's house thralls. They had made their way back to the house, where Dunston placed more wood on the fire. Aedwen noted how he positioned himself beside the door, but not with his back to the opening. He placed his silver-threaded axe within easy reach.
  
  Nothgyth had quickly produced wooden trenchers, some cheese, hard bread and some ale from the shadows in the hut. She unhooked the ham from where it hung from a beam and sliced off thick slabs of salty, greasy meat. She clearly knew where things were kept and soon the three of them were seated around the fire, eating food that until that day had been destined for Beornmod's folk's bellies.
  
  Dunston drained his cup of milk and then refilled it with ale. He took a deep draught, grimaced, and then emptied the cup again before pouring yet more ale. He sat back, stretching his legs out before him. He winced slightly as he straightened his right knee.
  
  "So, Nothgyth," he said. "What happened here? How is it that you alone survived?"
  
  Nothgyth stared into the fire for a time, chewing a morsel of bread which eventually she washed down with a mouthful of milk. Dunston waited patiently for her to answer, but Aedwen had begun to wonder whether the woman had heard the question by the time the thrall spoke at last.
  
  "I hid. Under the store." The store shed where they had found the murdered girl was raised from the earth on wooden posts in an effort to keep rats away from the grain and food stored within. "I was round the back picking some fresh summer sætherie when I heard them come. The number of them and how they came on horses frightened me. I've never seen so many riders before in one place." She gazed wistfully into the flames. Her eyes glimmered.
  
  "So you hid," prompted Dunston.
  
  "Not at first," she replied, as if he'd awoken her from a dream. "I just stood there listening to start with. Wanted to hear who they were. Thought they must have been the king's men. Perhaps the king himself had come to the master's hall."
  
  "There were so many of them?" asked Dunston.
  
  "Oh, many riders. Must have been five at least."
  
  Dunston frowned, but nodded.
  
  "So what happened?"
  
  "They talked for a moment to Frithstan. I couldn't hear what they said. Something about a peddler. It made no sense." She grew silent then. She nibbled on her bread, lost in her memories of that afternoon's chaos and violence.
  
  "What happened next?" Aedwen asked.
  
  "The men spotted Wynflaed. And they said things about her. Bad things. Frithstan grew angry and shouted at them, and one of them struck him. That is when Eohric and Tilwulf came back from the lower field. Eohric told the men to be gone…" Nothgyth's voice trailed off, as she relived the moment. "One of them speared him, without a word. As if Eohric was an animal. He didn't even have time to scream. He just fell into the mud and was dead. One of them laughed then, even though the others were angry with him."
  
  "Angry?" asked Dunston.
  
  "Yes. They said they weren't supposed to kill them. I couldn't hear much of what they said then though, because Wynflaed was screaming. A couple of them pushed her inside the store. For later, they said." Nothgyth's voice caught in her throat. "They bound her and left her there while they went to the hall. That is when I hid. I could see their feet and the hooves of their horses, and I heard how they hanged Tilwulf and Frithstan and the screams from the hall were so loud. But all the while I could hear Wynflaed crying just above me. I should have helped her," a sudden sob racked her. "I just hid there. Even while they…" Tears streaked through the dirt on her cheeks.
  
  "No, girl," said Dunston, his deep voice soothing in the darkness. "You did what you needed to do. You could not have saved her and what good would it have done for you to suffer her fate too?"
  
  "Perhaps God kept you safe for a reason," said Aedwen.
  
  "Truly?" asked Nothgyth, her tone pleading and desperate.
  
  "Truly," replied Aedwen. Surely God and the Virgin must have some purpose in all this. To think otherwise was too much to contemplate. "We mean to find these men," she continued, "and see they are brought to justice. God must have spared you so that you can help us."
  
  "Help you?" Nothgyth looked terrified. "How could I do that?"
  
  "You can tell us all you know about them," said Dunston, leaning forward, so that his jutting beard shadowed his face from the firelight. His eyes shone in the gloom.
  
  "I know nothing," she wailed. "I was hiding."
  
  "Think, tell us all you heard. Did you hear any of their names?"
  
  Nothgyth furrowed her brow and took another sip of milk. Slowly, she shook her head.
  
  "I don't know. I just heard them shouting at my master. And then I heard them laughing while Wynflaed screamed." She shuddered.
  
  "If I am able, Nothgyth," Dunston rumbled in the dark, "I will see these men killed for what they have done. Men who do such things do not deserve to live. Now," he reached over and gripped her arm. She flinched, but he held firm, looking directly into her eyes. "What can you tell us about who they were or what they were looking for."
  
  And then, her eyes widened as a fresh memory came to her.
  
  "I don't know who they are, but I know where they are going."
  
  "Tell me," Dunston said, his voice cold and hard.
  
  "They have gone after Ithamar."