was on the ground beside him. The blade’s entire length was slick with gore. Dodinal stared numbly at his hands. They were stained red, his clothes too.
He stood and walked on unsteady legs to the doorway. Even before he reached it he could see that what had been a slow drip of blood was now a torrent. Breathing deeply, he peered inside the hut, glimpsed the glistening mess of flesh, bone and offal scattered across the floor and was immediately and violently sick.
Turning quickly away, he slumped to the ground and was sick again and again, heaving when there was nothing left inside him until his stomach felt like it was being turned inside out. He could only lie there helpless, groaning and retching, until the spasms had passed.
Then he stood and wiped his mouth. Memories flashed through his head like snatches of a nightmare that remained on waking: the man reaching out for him, the sword slashing down, blood spurting, a severed hand spinning as it fell to the floor. The blade rising and then falling. A scarlet rain filling the air…
Dodinal gagged and swallowed the searing bile that rose in his throat. He had never drawn a man’s blood before; today, he had not merely drawn it but sprayed it liberally around the hut. He had chopped head and limbs from the body and hacked the torso to pieces, using a sword that was almost too heavy for him to lift. He had not been able to control himself. It was as if someone else had inhabited his body, someone wickedly strong and utterly without pity.
Dodinal was scared and shocked by his display of unrestrained violence. He was also strangely exhilarated.
As soon as he had recovered, he continued to look for his mother. Though he searched until darkness forced him to seek shelter for the night, he never found her. Often, in the lonely years that followed, he would reflect that never knowing her fate was a worse and more enduring agony than the certainty of her death.
The knight leaned against the doorway, gazing out across the deserted village. A long time had passed since then. His life had altered in a way he could never have foreseen, but in some ways it remained the same. He had been alone then, and he was alone now, and he imagined he would ever be so. Only one thing had changed: as a youth he had lusted only for vengeance, and now all he wanted was peace.
He did not think that was too much to ask for.
Dodinal sighed and closed the door.
No, not too much to ask for. Yet it eluded him.
Suddenly feeling the cold, he lowered himself to the mattress and pulled the furs over him. There he lay, eyes open, dwelling on his past while he waited for Rhiannon to return.
FIVE
The next morning he felt strong enough to leave the hut and decided it was time he met the chieftain Idris. Rhiannon made no secret of her displeasure, arguing he needed more rest. But Dodinal’s mind was made up; he had rested long enough.
She had arrived with a bowl containing more of the nuts and berries that her people currently broke their fast with.
“Your chieftain will think I lack courtesy if I do not pay my respects, now I am recovered,” Dodinal said around the mouthful of squirrel food he was reluctantly chewing. His stomach rumbled. Rhiannon had brought him more cawl the previous day, along with some flat bread, but nothing since. “All the more so because he was courteous enough to allow me to recover in peace.”
“It was not so much courtesy as common sense.” Rhiannon stood over him with folded arms and a stern look on her face. “He knew that disturbing you before you were ready to see him could hamper your recovery. And I would have had more work to do.”
“Ah,” Dodinal grinned. “No doubt you set him straight on that. So it was not so much common sense as his fear of you.”
Rhiannon gave him a withering, thin-lipped glare. “Next time you can stitch your own leg.” But she flashed a smile that vanished as quickly as it had appeared. She was not angry, and even seemed pleased at how swiftly he was healing. Of course, that might only be because she wanted him out of her hut as quickly as good manners allowed, yet he believed she was proud of her healing abilities, for all her reluctance to speak of them.
“I’ll tell Idris you will call on him,” Rhiannon said.
Dodinal raised an eyebrow. “Is that necessary? I mean only to pay him my regards and thank him for sharing his food.”
“He will have none of that, mark my words. Owain is his only grandson and the old man dotes on him. I suspect he would have wanted you to take longer to get well. He tries not to show it, but he is enjoying having Owain spend more time with him than usual. Like me, he will be forever in your debt.”
Her words made him uneasy. It was not in his character to draw attention to himself.
“I only did what any man would have done.”
“I know many men who would have left him to his fate. As I have already said, I do not believe you are like other men.”
“All men are the same,” he countered.
“No, they are not. Now finish your food. I will tell Idris you are ready to meet him so he can get prepared.”
Prepared? A greeting, a handshake, perhaps a few words of friendship were all that needed to pass between the two men. Unless these villagers had customs he was unfamiliar with. No matter. He would find out soon enough. “I’ll dress while you are gone.”
“You need to wash first,” she answered. “You stink.”
“And you are too kind.”
Rhiannon smiled as she went over to the fire and took the pot outside to fill it with snow, then set it over the flames. She took an old blanket and a misshapen nugget of soap from the dresser. “This will clear away the worst of the stench.”
It was obvious she was teasing him. Then again, he thought, sniffing at his chest and armpits, perhaps not. He had become so used to his own ripe scent while wandering the wintry wilderness that he had not really noticed it until now.
The moment Rhiannon had gone, he stripped and washed away the grime, revealing rubbed-raw flesh beneath. The water that pooled at his feet was dark and scummy, and steamed in the heat of the fire. Once he was as clean as he thought he could be, he used the cloth to dry before pulling on his clothes. It felt good to be in them again. It would feel even better to have his sword at his side.
When Rhiannon returned, she had her son with her, the boy giving Dodinal the same silent look as before. Then he knelt on the floor and reached under his tunic, pulling out a small pouch that hung from his neck by a leather strap. He emptied its contents into his hand, far more interested in them than in Dodinal.
“He seems less pleased to see me,” Dodinal observed.
Rhiannon watched the boy affectionately. “He knows you are well now, that’s why. He was worried you might die.”
The knight said nothing. How strange to think that someone should fear his death when he himself did not.
“You smell much better,” she said, smiling. “But you still look like a wild man. Sit here.”
Dodinal obeyed. There was no point arguing. He sat on the bench while she took a wooden comb from the dresser and attacked his hair; it felt like it was being torn out by the roots. “Keep still,” she chided. “Anyone would swear you were a child.”
Finally she was done. His scalp tingled, yet when Rhiannon started on his beard the pain in his head paled into insignificance. He reached up but she slapped his hand away. “I wouldn’t be surprised to find wildlife in here. Do you want to be presented to Idris harbouring mice?”
Dodinal gritted his teeth and said nothing, not even when Rhiannon produced a small knife and cut away at his hair and beard until clumps of it were scattered on the floor at his feet.
