The whine of the slave was unmistakable. As he spoke he kept pushing the cart forward, making sure the aged reek of twenty years of human dung got well to the thane’s nostrils. The thane gave up, walked away still waving a hand in front of his face.
It would be hard to make this a story for poets, Shef reflected. No poet had ever found a place for the likes of Cwicca. yet the plan could never work without him. Slaves, freemen, and warriors looked different from each other, walked and talked differently. No thane could ever doubt that Cwicca was a slave on an errand. How could an enemy warrior be so undersized?
The gang reached the door of the women’s privy, at the rear of the great quarter-acre pavilion. In front of it stood the permanent sentry, one of Burgred’s hearth-companions, six feet tall and fully armed from helmet to studded boots. From his place in the shadows Shef watched intently. It was a critical moment, he knew. Cwicca had blocked as much of the view as possible with his cart, but just the same a watchful eye might be there in the darkness.
The gang surrounded the companion-sentry, pressing round him, deferential but determined, pawing at his sleeve as they tried to explain. Catching his sleeve, catching his arm, pulling him down as a skinny arm shut off his throat. A momentary heave, a strangled half-cry. Then a spurt of blood black in the moonlight as Cwicca passed a razor-sharp knife across vein and artery and windpipe, cutting down to the neckbone with the force of one slash.
As the sentry fell forward, was seized by six pairs of hands and upended into the cart, Shef reached them, grabbing the helmet, spear and shield. In a moment he too was out in the moonlight, waving the dung-cart impatiently on. Now any watchful eye would see only what was normal: the armed six-footer waving forward a gang of dwarvish toilers. As Cwicca’s gang got the door open, pressed round it with their shovels and buckets, Shef stood for a moment in full view. Then stepped back into the shadow as if to watch the slaves more closely.
A moment later and he was through the door. And Godive was in his arms, naked beneath her shift.
“I couldn’t get my clothes,” she whispered. “He locks them away every night. And Alfgar—Alfgar took the drink. But Wulfgar sleeps also within our booth, and he would drink no ale because it is a fast-day. He saw me leave. He may cry out if I do not return.”
Good, thought Shef, his brain cold as ice in spite of the warmth in his arms. Now what I meant to do all along will seem natural to her. So much less to explain. Maybe she will never know that I did not come for her.
Behind him, Cwicca’s men were pressing in, still giving the impression of men trying to work quietly but openly.
“I am going into the sleeping-chamber,” Shef whispered to them. “The lady will show me. If you hear an alarm, flee at once.”
As they stepped into the unlit passage between the little individual sleeping-places of Burgred’s most trusted courtiers—Godive moving with the sureness of one who had walked it a hundred times—Shef heard Cwicca’s voice behind him. “Well, since we’re here we might as well do the job. What’s a few buckets of shit in a day’s work?”
Godive paused as they reached the lowered canvas flap, pointed, spoke almost soundlessly. “Wulfgar. To the left. He sleeps in our room many nights, so I can turn him. He is in his box.”
I have no gag, thought Shef. I expected him to be asleep. Silently he caught the hem of Godive’s shift, began to lift it up over her body. For a moment she caught at the material with automatic modesty, then gave way, let him strip her naked. The first time I have done that, thought Shef. I never imagined it would be no pleasure. But if she enters naked, Wulfgar, will be confused. It may give me an extra moment.
He pushed her bare back forward, felt the wince and the familiar feel of dried blood. Rage filled him, rage at Alfgar, rage too at himself. Why had he not thought, not once these long months, what they must be doing to her?