Leaning into the tree she sat beneath, she tipped back her head and put her lips around the spout of a waterskin. On this third day of bringing in the harvest, the thirst of working dawn to mid-afternoon was hard to quench. Though long ago she had set aside the privileges of a lady whose toil was mostly that of supervising the toil of others, and now the stamina and strength required to work the land were supported by muscles more developed than years past, still she tired and ached. Hopefully, a short nap would refresh.
“Ah, there you are!”
Vilda nearly choked. Coughing and clearing water from her throat, she lowered the skin and swung her gaze to the woman from whom she had slipped away.
Wearing a heavily soiled gown that in no way resembled the finery eschewed all these weeks since Vilda brought her up out of the water, Theta ran from the field to the copse and dropped down beside the one to whom she was suffocatingly intent on showing gratitude.
Vilda had not believed Theta could long maintain that pretense if that was what it was, but the ugliness of the woman she had known had yet to re-emerge. She was so different, it seemed a miracle. Seemed.
Though Theta was pleasant and had packed away the harlot to earn her keep in ways that benefitted the resistance, still Vilda questioned her sincerity. So did Hereward and the men now denied her carnal favors.
Do I wrong her? Vilda questioned again. Am I the same as those of the Bible who cast stones at the adulteress Jesus defended?
Though she feared accepting Theta was changed lest it render her and others vulnerable, she wanted to believe her fellow Saxon was worthier of kind regard than Lady Nicola whose departure had made Vilda feel as if something was lost—something not precious, and yet…
She did not know.
Aye, you do, scoffed the voice within that rarely slipped its bonds. You feel the loss of womanly friendship.
Of which I am unworthy, she retorted, then pushed from remembrance those who had sacrificed that which she had narrowly avoided losing.
Returning Theta’s face to focus and seeing concern there, Vilda thought how grateful the woman would be if she knew the reason her overtures of friendship were rejected.
“Are you ill?” Theta asked.
“Ill?”
“You were flushed. Now you are pale.”
Such was the effect of memories sown at her wedding feast that still possessed the power to chill. “As you know, it has been a long day.”
Theta scooted backward and leaned into the tree trunk. “I know, indeed.” She uncapped her waterskin. After satisfying her thirst, she said, “Had I not nearly crippled my knees praying for the Lord to forgive my sins and promising I would make restitution by abstaining from further abuse of my body, I might yield to one of those monied nobles who keep pestering me to don lighter skirts.”
“I am glad you resist,” Vilda said and, accepting there was no possibility of a nap, pushed upright. “I must return to the field so another may take her rest. Once we finish with what falls to the scythe here, we go to the next field to gather and bundle all that can be had ere dusk.”
“I shall rejoin you after a short nap,” Theta said.
Telling herself it was her own fault she had not gained one herself, having wasted her rest on ponderings and memories, Vilda retrieved the basket she was certain she had filled and emptied a hundred times since dawn and returned to her work alongside the other women.
Hardly had she begun to perspire anew than a cry pierced the air. Likely, none knew it was of Theta until her next cry was carried on the word, “Smoke!”
All those who had stilled in their labors craned their necks to search out evidence they hoped would not be found.
There it was, billowing grey rising above the trees between this field and a north-easterly one.
“Pray, Lord, let it be an accident,” Vilda rasped, and a moment later saw the men who had been cutting wheat well ahead of the gatherers set off in the direction of that other field, doubtless to give aid. And now the women dropped their baskets to follow.
It occurring that if it was no accident, better the harvesters remain here and protect this field, she called, “Come back! We must spread out to preserve this crop.”
Were she heard, she was ignored, and soon she stood alone amid a swath of mown wheat and scattered baskets—but no scythes, the men having taken those blades that were as near to swords as they possessed.
“Normans!” Theta ran to Vilda and gripped her arm. “They come this way.”
Hand going to the sling fastened to her belt alongside a purse that held stones for the flying, Vilda looked all around and saw nothing to indicate the enemy approached. “Where did you see them?”
“Among the trees to the east. They move stealthily, but there is no hiding the glint of chain mail when they pass through light.” As Vilda looked that direction, Theta shrilled, “Soon this will be aflame as well.” She wrenched on Vilda’s arm and, meeting resistance, snapped, “We can do naught here. We must leave and pray the Lord clears a path for us.”
Vilda knew if it was true Normans came this way, the best she could do was knock a few unconscious before sacrificing herself, but she balked at abandoning a crop needed to feed those of Ely for whom it was now too dangerous to forage beyond these shores. Blessedly, the need for this wheat would not be immediate since two days of harvest were behind them and those stores were sizable enough to sustain all providing they were rationed.
A slap snapping her head to the side, instinctively she raised a hand to strike back—and would have had not Theta grabbed that wrist. “Forgive me, but you must leave behind the past or wherever you drift and be present now, else they will
