text: Aedwen awoke when the sun was high in the sky. She stretched and was surprised to find she was warm. She had become so cold in the long wet miserable night she had thought she might perish. Her teeth had begun to chatter and her head had ached by the time Dunston had made the shelter in the shadow of the sallow tree.
  
  She opened her eyes and saw that the fire was still burning and there were more logs piled nearby. There was no sign of Dunston. For an instant she felt panic rise within her. What would she do if he had left her? But just as quickly as the fear of being abandoned had come upon her, so it fled; dispelled by the warmth from the small campfire. She sat up and found that Dunston had covered her with a thick layer of bracken. The old man was surly at times, and he scared her, but no, she was certain he would not leave her to her fate alone in the forest.
  
  The fire was burning low, so she took one of the logs and placed it carefully onto the embers. The rain had ceased falling but the sky was heavy and overcast. The day was hushed and the woodland dripped and murmured.
  
  Aedwen's stomach grumbled. She hoped Dunston had gone in search of something to eat. He seemed to be able to find food anywhere. She picked up a twig and poked at the fire. She frowned to think of the cold nights she had spent with her father on the road. If only they'd had Dunston for a travelling companion, they would never have been hungry or without warmth. She thought of his huge axe and how quickly he had felled the man in Briuuetone. If Dunston had travelled with them, she thought, her father would probably still be alive. The questions around why he had been killed still plagued her thoughts, but she pushed them aside with an effort. She could not bear to spend the day gnawing on the same bones of ideas. They had plucked all the meat from them and they would glean no further information by chewing over them again. She hoped they would learn some useful piece of information when they spoke to those who had traded with her father as they had made their way northward. Until then, she vowed to try to think of happier things than her father's murder.
  
  Running her fingers through her hair, she felt tangles and knots. When was the last time she had given it a proper brush? Could it be only the night before last? Maethild and Godgifu had both combed her long tresses, each plaiting her hair into long braids. Aedwen had revelled in the soft touch from the sisters' delicate hands, missing her mother terribly with each pull of the antler comb. At some point in the nights and day since then, the leather thongs they had used to tie her hair up had worked loose and she had lost them. The hair fell around her shoulders now in an unruly mess. She dreaded to think of how she must look.
  
  She smiled to herself. Her mother had always despaired at Aedwen's lack of care with her hair and appearance in general. She would fuss about her, rubbing Aedwen's face with a cloth until her cheeks were red and smarting. And when she had finished with her hair and face, she would go to work on her hands and nails. Aedwen had always complained, trying to escape her mother's clutches at the first opportunity, to flee out into the fields, or woods, or to run along the beach, where she would quickly undo her mother's work.
  
  She sniffed at her kirtle. It stank of woodsmoke, sweat and fear.
  
  How she longed for a bowl of hot water and a linen cloth with which to clean herself. And how she missed her mother.
  
  A quiet rustle in the trees made her think that a breeze was picking up. But a heartbeat later, Dunston stepped into the clearing. She noted that his limp seemed less pronounced than the day before. He carried his axe in one hand and in his other there dangled the carcass of a squirrel.
  
  He smiled at her through his wiry silver-streaked beard.
  
  "Awake at last, I see," he said. "How are you feeling?"
  
  "Well," she said, "thanks to you. I don't know what I would have done without you."
  
  He shrugged, but said nothing. Pulling the seax from his belt he set about skinning and gutting the squirrel.
  
  "You have brought us food again," she said, her voice filled with awe. "I do not know how you do it."
  
  "I have learnt the ways of the forest. She will feed you well enough, if you know where to look."
  
  "How did you catch the squirrel?"
  
  He grunted as he pulled the skin from the animal, as though it were a tight-fitting jacket. The flesh that was left looked long and scrawny, but Aedwen's stomach groaned at the thought of roasted meat.
  
  "I found where the animals travel and I placed a snare there. I did not have to wait for long."
  
  Working deftly and with the alacrity that comes from many years of experience, Dunston tugged the entrails from the game and began threading the animal onto a spit of wood. Aedwen watched carefully, trying to remember everything.
  
  "After we've eaten, we should carry on to Spercheforde," Dunston said. "I have been up to the road and know where we are. We will be able to reach the settlement before dusk."
  
  "Do you think someone there will be able to help us?" she asked.
  
  "I do not know," said Dunston, placing the spitted squirrel over the fire's embers. "But you said you and your father had travelled through, so someone might have spoken to him. Perhaps the meeting with Hunfrith was not the only thing he kept from you."
  
  His words held no reproach or judgement and yet Aedwen felt a keen stab of an emotion she could not define. There was no doubt that her father had been holding a secret from her. A secret that might have got him killed. And the fact he had not told her hurt her more than she cared to admit, even to herself.
  
  Dunston stood and inspected his handiwork.
  
  "There is a stream down there, if you would like to drink or wash." He pointed beyond a copse of alder. "I'll keep an eye on this."
  
  She must indeed look terrible if the old man who lived alone in the forest thought she should wash.
  
  "Is it far?" she asked, anxiety gripping her.
  
  "No, Aedwen," he replied, his voice softening, "it is not far. And that way is away from the road. You will encounter nobody."
  
  She let out a breath and nodded.
  
  Aedwen shook off the rest of the bracken that covered her legs and made her way past the alders. The stream was nearby. Fast-flowing, clear water flowed over a bed of shiny pebbles. She drank and the water was sweet and fresh. Then, scooping up handfuls of water, she scrubbed her face and did her best to wash the grime from her hands and arms.
  
  When she returned to their camp, the smell of cooking meat was strong. Her stomach complained at its emptiness once more, and she swallowed the saliva that flooded her mouth.
  
  "The meat will be ready soon," Dunston said. "Better?"
  
  She nodded.
  
  "Yes, I am," she said. "I can scarcely believe I slept so well in such a shelter."
  
  "The body does not need much to be happy," Dunston said. "But it is the things we do not need that cause us most pain."
  
  She pondered his words.
  
  "What do you mean?" she asked, at last.
  
  He turned the squirrel. Its flesh was dark now, sizzling and bubbling fat dropped into the embers making them flare and flash.
  
  "Men always strive for what they do not have. But to reach the object of their desire does not make them content. When a man attains his goals, he merely looks further to the horizon, for the next prize. It is why men will never be happy and why we will never know peace."
  
  Aedwen's brow furrowed. Dunston's bleak words made her sad.
  
  "Do you truly believe that?"
  
  Dunston nodded.
  
  "The Norsemen see our lands and come to steal our riches, and so we fight."
  
  "But they are pagans. They know not the love of the Lord. I pray that one day the Norse will become followers of Christ, and then surely we will know peace."
  
  Dunston snorted and his amusement at her words angered her.
  
  "Does not the Christian king of Wessex seek to control Mercia?" he said. "Do not the Christian Wéalas fight us Anglisc for our land and our livestock? No, the priests may say that Christ is the God of love, but He does not make men content with their lot in life. Perhaps one day the Norse will worship Him too, but if they do and even if they live in peace with us, others will come, seeking what the Vikingr once sought – land and riches. Just as our forebears came to these lands to take the land from the Wéalas."
  
  He lifted the squirrel from the fire and cut a small sliver of meat. He proffered it to her, skewered on the tip of the seax. She took it, blew to cool it and then placed it in her mouth.
  
  "It is good," she said, speaking around the food. She was glad of the change of topic away from Dunston's dark vision of the world. She could not believe in such a grim future, where nobody was ever contented and war would constantly ravage the land. She needed to cling to the hope that Christ and His mother, the Blessed Virgin, would bring happiness and tranquillity to all mankind.
  
  They ate quietly. Dunston cut up the squirrel and shared out the pieces between them. The outside of the meat was dark and crisp, but parts of the flesh near the bone were almost raw, pink and still dripping blood. This was no matter to Aedwen. She had been ravenous and chewed the meat until the bones were clean. Then she sucked the marrow from the thicker ones.
  
  They talked little as they struck camp. There was not much to do apart from see that the fire was safely extinguished. Very soon, with the sun beginning its downward journey into the west, they clambered up through the dense woodland and back onto the road.
  
  Aedwen held the staff Dunston had given her. It already felt natural in her hand and she walked along beside him with purpose. Despite the cold and wet of the previous night, they were both rested and filled with renewed vigour.
  
  "If we hear horses on the road, we will hide," Dunston said.
  
  Aedwen said nothing, but nodded.
  
  "Horses," Dunston explained, "can only mean trouble for us as far as I see it, so it is not worth taking any chances."
  
  Aedwen nodded again and they walked on in silence beneath the canopy of beech and oak.
  
  As it turned out, they neither heard nor saw any horses, or indeed anybody at all, until they left the shadow of the wood. The sun was well into the west now, but still high enough in the sky for them to have ample light left to reach Spercheforde.
  
  The road led them down between ploughed fields and hedgerows. Strips of farmland stretched out before them. In the distance, a man was busy plucking weeds from between the rows of a crop of wheat.
  
  A cluster of houses, barns and a small timber church nestled in the valley.
  
  "I am known here," said Dunston, breaking the silence that had fallen between them. "I sometimes trade pelts and knives with the folk. We should have no trouble."
  
  Despite his words, Aedwen noted how he seemed to grow in stature and how his gaze darted about, as if looking for threats.
  
  The man halted his weeding, shading his hands to better see who approached the village. Then, he slung his weed hook and stick over his shoulder and set a course that would intercept theirs as they reached the houses. Dunston did not slow his pace.
  
  For a time the man was lost from sight behind a hedgerow that was a-chatter with sparrows. Then, just as the path sloped down into the shallows of the river, he stepped from a break in the hedge.
  
  Aedwen held her breath, ready to flee, but Dunston halted, lowering his axe's patterned iron head to rest on the earth.
  
  The man was slender and wore a wide-brimmed hat woven from straw like a basket. His sinewy arms were bare, weather-beaten and smeared with mud.
  
  "Well met, Snell," said Dunston.
  
  The man peered at him and then at Aedwen from under the shade of his hat. He sniffed and wiped the back of his hand under his nose.
  
  "I did not know you had any children," Snell said, nodding in Aedwen's direction.
  
  "She is not my daughter," replied Dunston.
  
  "New wife, is she? Got tired of cooking your own pottage? You must get lonely out in Sealhwudu."
  
  "No," replied Dunston, an edge of annoyance in his tone.
  
  "Thrall then?"
  
  "She is not my child, my wife or my slave, Snell. Her father was killed. She has nobody."
  
  Snell removed his hat and scratched his thatch of curly, greying hair.
  
  "Oh yes," he said, replacing the hat and examining something he had found on his scalp, "I heard about that." He squeezed the nails of his thumb and forefinger together. He grunted, evidently content with the fate he had delivered to the louse.
  
  "Heard what?" asked Dunston.
  
  "That you killed a girl's father and then stole her away and fled justice."
  
  Dunston stepped back slightly, perhaps to better swing his axe should it come to that, thought Aedwen.
  
  "What you have heard is not true."
  
  "P'rhaps," said Snell, looking askance at Aedwen, "but here you are, with the girl they spoke of."
  
  "Dunston did not kill my father," Aedwen said.
  
  Snell stared at her for several heartbeats, rubbing his chin. He sniffed again.
  
  "P'rhaps," he said at last. "Mayhap he did, mayhap he didn't. Those that came here seemed to think he did." He turned his attention back to Dunston. "They had nothing good to say of you."
  
  Dunston snorted and Aedwen was surprised to see Snell smirk.
  
  "Who were they?" Dunston asked.
  
  "Well, I didn't get all of their names, but they were a rum-looking lot. Said they were sent by the new reeve of Briuuetone. One of them had really been in the wars, looked like he'd fought a Mercian warband and lost. His face was a state – blue and black like a stormy day in January. Swollen too. Though it wasn't he who did the talking, seems someone broke his jaw when they were escaping."
  
  "How many were there and when did they come through?"
  
  "Five of them rode up this morning asking if I'd seen you and the girl."
  
  "And what did you tell them?"
  
  "Said I hadn't seen you since before Crístesmæsse."
  
  "Good man," said Dunston.
  
  "Well, it was the truth." Snell seemed awkward all of a sudden. He craned his neck, scanning the hills and woodlands surrounding the settlement, as if he expected the riders to return at any moment. "What shall I tell them if they come back?"
  
  "You can tell them what you wish, but you have known me for many years, Snell and I tell you I am innocent of this crime. All we seek now is to find out who slew this poor girl's father."
  
  "Well, I am sure it weren't nobody from Spercheforde. The closest to a killer you'll find here is Herelufu. Her ale is so strong you feel like death after drinking more than a cupful."
  
  Dunston snorted.
  
  "I do not think the man's murderer is from here."
  
  "So what are you doing here?"
  
  "We are looking for anyone he might have spoken to. We are hoping we might be able to find some indication of why he was killed."
  
  Snell removed his hat again and scratched frantically at his head. He peered at Aedwen. He seemed agitated.
  
  "What is it?"
  
  "I remember the girl and her father now. They came through here a few days ago, but he had nothing that the likes of me or Herelufu needed, and so we sent him up to Beornmod's hall at Cantmael."
  
  "That's right," said Aedwen. "I remember the hall at Cantmael." It had been the last time she had felt safe. "It was warm and they let me sleep in the bed chamber with the womenfolk. Father stayed up late drinking. He sold a bolt of linen, but he drank too much of the ale. The next day he was pale and we had to stop several times for him to rest."
  
  "We will go and speak to Beornmod and see what he can tell us."
  
  "You had best tread with care, Dunston."
  
  "What do you mean?"
  
  "The reeve's men asked the same questions as you. Asked who the girl's father had spoken to. I sent them to Beornmod's hall."
  
  Dunston frowned.
  
  "The hall is not far from here, and they are mounted. With any luck, they will be gone by now."
  
  "I've been in the field all day and no riders have come back down the road."