Gemini Thunder (20 page)

Back at Combe Castle, Freyja wept with tears of joy. Such simple idiots these Celts, although she had enjoyed her little role-play as the devil.

‘Do you know where he is that I might destroy him?’ She imitated the deep bass voice she’d used before cackling in laughter again. Poor deluded fools. Put on a deep voice, vibrate the floor, and drop a few scorch marks, and there you have it.

Satan himself.

Only a veneficus knew the absolute futility of devil worship and all that went with it; but, it had worked and she now had a sure way of tracking the king and his detestable magic man.

Didn’t she, Mr. Boatman and youngest son? You are going to lead the clever Freyja to her enemies and then she will destroy them.

Bell glided into the small clearing on Swifty’s Island and landed gently on Twilight’s shoulder. After a brief show of homage to his liege-lord with the outstretched talon, he chitted in the enchanter’s ear.

‘Thank you, Bell,’ said Twilight softly as the bird took off. ‘That is interesting news.’

Later that day as Ike and Ifor were gently poling along a stretch of the River Cary, Twilight appeared on the front of the boat.

‘Don’t be alarmed, Ike, Ifor,’ he said quickly as a very surprised Ike was about to take a swing at him with his pole and Ifor dive overboard. ‘I am a friend and with the king on Swifty’s Island.’

In their trips to Swifty’s Island they hadn’t seen Twilight, although Southee had mentioned the presence of a very clever sorcerer. This was obviously him. Twilight explained briefly the fact that his pica were able to pick up auras and earlier today they had picked up one in Ike’s house. Although it was all mumbo-jumbo to him, Ike got the gist of what the sorcerer was telling him.

‘The aura they picked up was that of Freyja, the sorceress to the Viking. She has been in your house, Ike.’

Ike poled the punt over to the bank and tied up under a low-hanging willow. Strangely, although the sorcerer was a fully grown man, there was no extra weight on the boat.

Ike told Twilight about Gretchen’s and his family’s preoccupation with Satanism. Could that have anything to do with the visit from this Freyja?

‘Possibly, but we’re going to have to assume that you’re a marked man from now on. Freyja can follow you anywhere without your knowing. She can make herself invisible to all but my pica and me.’

‘Does that mean Ifor and me will have to keep away from Swifty’s?’ Ike said.

‘Not for long.’ The astounder smiled. ‘I have a plan that could turn this to our advantage.’

Then he turned serious.

‘If the plan works, Ike, it could be bad for Gretchen and the rest of your family. The Viking will take out their brutal revenge on them.’

Ike thought for a few moments. There were tears in his eyes.

‘Can you do anything to save them? I know Gretchen’s been foolish with this Satan stuff, but they don’t deserve to be killed for it. Just a passing fad, something to fill the long days with. The old girl will learn from this and get back to being a proper wife, mother, and grandmother again. And the rest of my kids, they’ll all learn and move on, become better people, eh, Ifor?’

Ifor also had tears streaming down his young face. Too emotional to speak, he could only nod.

Twilight ruffled the tearful boy’s long hair.

‘Ike,’ he said earnestly. ‘I will do everything in my power to save them. You will all have to go away for a while, away from the Viking and this place. Just as soon as we get rid of these savages you will all return.’

Ike and Ifor both clasped Twilight’s hand in gratitude.

‘Now,’ said the miracle-monger. ‘About this plan.’

When the history of this time is written, it will not speak of the heroics of ordinary Celtic folk such as Sam Southee and those of his cohort and the many thousands who lost their lives for Alfred at Winchester or Chippingham. Neither will it make any mention of the pointless sacrifices made by Septimus Godleman and Ebroin and his fellow druids at the Order of Lacock, or any other of the many families and small gatherings swept aside by the vicious Viking as they charged through the Wessex countryside.

History relies on rulers, leaders, those at the top; therefore it is King Alfred who will carry the weight of recall of this period as did Arthur before and the Romans before him. And so on through time. The stardust of history only sprinkles the shoulders of the sovereign absolute. The rest of us remain in a kind of obscure thrall to their crowns.

The huge parts played by the Wessex venefici, particularly Twilight, will not receive much of a mention either, and, whilst the alpha skills of Merlin’s earthshine will vibrate down the years, he is an exception. The murky skills of the venefici are too oblique and misunderstood, nay, considered impossible even by those living with them and witnessing the day-to-day reality of the astoundments in action, to ever be considered real.

The general human condition of this time is programmed to accept only what it understands. Gentle, lyrical Celts worshipping the idols and symbols of their forefathers, united by shared customs and dialects, shackled by poverty and the bondage of serfdom. They will raise sacred altars to diverse deities, build shrines of earth and stone, fashion jewelled icons, charms, and luck pieces, and by these swear oaths, promises, incantations, and sacrifices, but none of it will relate to the venefical accomplishments. Why should it?

Inexplicable, ethereal, phenomena-changing, shape-shifting, mind communication, and immediate transporting between places belong to another world, another dimension, an alien place inhabited by demi-gods where nothing is as it seems.

The great advantage venefici have over all other real or imagined wonder-workers is that they walk among us, look like us, and live with us as ordinary human beings. For ten thousand years, right from the very beginning, Nuada the First Chosen, venefici have lived as those around them did. A brief walk through the venefical line from Nuada to the twenty-eighth, Malcolm of Marlborough, the forty-second Quendis of Bassett, the fiftieth Prefect Elaine, the eightieth Eleanor of the Horses, the ninety-fifth Zero the Romany, right up to the present holder Twilight, each and every one of them appeared and acted, most of the time, as ordinary mortals.

Even when they officiated at the annual ceremony of the cowering dead at Stonehenge, the prime reason for the Wessex venefical presence on this turning earth, they still looked and acted completely normal. This enigmatic ordinariness and its accompanying anonymity were deliberately fostered by the Wessex venefici.

Merlin made a bit of a mess of it by becoming famous alongside King Arthur, a situation he sought for the last fifty years of his life to rectify through the redemption of their time together. That he never succeeded was due to the golden glow he’d previously created around
Dux Bellorum
, the charismatic battle leader that King Arthur became in the eyes of the people.

Wessex venefici do not want to acquire the status of a special person or demi-god, or be on the receiving end of any form of worship or virtuous homage to their skills and achievements with the enchantments. Other astounders may be different, but the Wessex preference has always been to quietly go about their business without fear or favour, living normally and working for the collective good of the Celts and Wessex. Until someone threatens that collective good—then the responses are quicker and more deadly than a snake strike as the cloak of anonymity is thrown aside to defend the cause.

And still is to this day.

Freyja, welcome to my lands, where you will find matters far more difficult than those you left and from where I have just returned. I never forget an injustice to my people or my animals. That is why I have just destroyed your other odious twin, Go-ian, your son. He was responsible for the deaths of many Celts and animals whilst he was here, and for that he must pay the ultimate price. I gave him no more chance than your other half-powered girl Gemini, and his end was instant. From the very brief conversation we had before I sent him to Valhalla, he was a spent, miserable, and finished force. He told me that when his sister died by my hand, his life effectively ended. When you sent him home in disgrace there was nothing left for him to live for. Had I not finished his miserable existence, it was only a matter of time before he would have done it himself. That is what you and your brutal raiders have brought about by coming here. Soon all of you will suffer the same fate, most of it by my hand.

No more bears or eagles either, odious, motherless hag. They left your employ with the deaths of your odious spawn. All you have left are those useless pigs in ligamen to you. Other than grunting and squealing I cannot see what use they will be other than target practice, something else for us to kill and roast over our glowing fires.

So now, wrinkled replacement for mediocrity, you are old, childless, and in my land. The brutal Viking will not have a veneficus to take them forward when you are gone, and the entire civilization will be quickly wiped out. Which will be soon, evil little Freyja, so named after the Norse goddess of love.

Very soon.

Freyja was sitting with Guthrum, Ove Thorsten, and Olaf Tryggvason in the Combe Castle hall when she received this mind message from Twilight. For a moment she went rigid and then slowly got to her feet. Guthrum’s excessive and frenetic bursts of vein-straining, berserker rage were nothing compared to the one the wrinkled old venefica gave in to now. A deafening scream ripped out of her throat with the velocity of a lightning streak. Its piercing violence slammed through the castle and surrounding grounds, causing strong, Roman-built walls to tremble dust and mortar from the joints, and trees to topple over. Warriors dived for cover as it smashed down their tents and scorched across the landscape. The local rivers boiled and frothed, cattle were flattened, crops beheaded, and birds knocked from the air. Guthrum and his companions were driven back against the wall as if spun in a vast centrifuge and held there like human paintings. Solid oaken furniture disintegrated to splinters all around the room, and a mélange of pewter plates and utensils ricocheted around like red hot hell-cats. The only thing that didn’t move in the catatonic blast was the slight figure of Freyja herself. Who finally wound down.

Deafened and stunned warriors picked themselves from the floor, looking about them in confusion as debris fell to the ground. Gradually everything got back to normal, apart from the mess everywhere. Freyja stood silent for a long time, her gray old head down. Olaf Tryggvason was the first to approach her.

‘The Wessex veneficus has done something?’ he asked quietly, guessing that such an outburst could only be down to one person.

Freyja raised her wrinkled old face to the red-haired chieftain.

‘He has been to the lowlands and killed my son,’ she replied in an empty voice. ‘Both of my twin babies are now dead by his hand.’

For the next three days, Freyja brooded and dreamed of the many ways she would revenge her twins. Finally, leaving her grief aside, she decided that there was no vengeance in inactivity. The fight-back began with a swift transformation to the clouds over the Penbarrow hamlet where she waited until Ike Penbarrow and his son poled their early morning, roundabout way through the weed-clogged streams of the Levels. Eventually after much doubling back they tied up at a remote island. Dropping off various sacks of supplies on a shallow bank, they then retraced their route carefully to the main channels where they then began their daily rounds of bartering and exchanging goods. In the middle of the remote island, a wisp of smoke drifted from the old hovel well-hidden in a small copse at its centre. Guessing that Twilight was there protecting King Alfred, Freyja kept high and distant lest she be discovered. Eventually Desmond, the troubadour and companion of Twilight, came out of the hovel and began to carry the sacks inside. Got him.

That night she confirmed to Guthrum that she had discovered the whereabouts of the two people they all wanted dead most on earth and plans were made.

Ike Penbarrow and Ifor followed Twilight’s instructions perfectly for four days and on the fifth day stayed at home. Each day they’d poled the circuitous route to False Island and dropped off some sacks filled with earth. False Island was the name given by Desmond to this place. On the fifth day as the dawn light began to glimmer around the Levels, the soft splashing of many paddles could be heard converging upon the island where Ike and Ifor had been watched by Freyja delivering supplies. As the small flotilla of stolen boats of all shapes and sizes began to converge on the island, they fanned out to surround it. Each boat had between five and ten heavily armed Viking in it, some of whom were paddling quietly. The lead boat was commanded by Ove Thorsten, and Freyja was poised high in the air above.

A puff of wispy smoke eased skyward from the hole in the hovel roof, signalling that someone was awake and stoking the embers of the fire into life. Each boat pulled quietly into a landing area on the island and waited for the barrage to begin. As soon as everyone was in place, Freyja opened up with salvo after salvo onto the old hovel, which immediately disappeared under the onslaught in a cloud of smoke and flames.

‘Now!’ she shouted in Thorsten’s ear, and the Viking warriors poured out of the boats and charged into the blanket of smoke that had began to settle over the small island. Where the hovel had stood was a gaping great crater. All the trees in the copse around it had been blown to pieces.