Fury flashed over Mancas’ features. He was not used to being dismissed so summarily. Like Eadmaer before him, he seemed about to respond, and then thought better of it. He had lost face, it was true, and yet most of the crew were back at the ship. He swallowed his anger and said no more. If he had questioned Runolf further, I do not know what might have happened. After that fleeting moment of warmth he had shown me, a cold hard anger had settled upon Runolf, making me wonder whether he had an inkling of who the perpetrator of the destruction might be.

What Runolf thought about it was unclear, for he had already turned away and was striding back down the hill along the path that would take him through the burnt husks of the buildings and to Brymsteda and the crew waiting by the beach.

Mancas looked after him and sighed. I avoided his gaze, sure that he would rather not share the moment with me. We were just about to follow Runolf when there came a sudden commotion from the trees. Arcenbryht and Beorn had gone into the thicket to relieve themselves and a sudden shouting startled us all.

“Go and see what is happening,” snapped Mancas, perhaps glad to be issuing an order he knew would be followed.

Oswald and Cumbra drew their swords and hurried towards the trees. But before they could reach them, Beorn and Arcenbryht came into the dying light of the day pulling an elderly man between them.

The man was wizened, with wisps of white hair straggling from beneath his cap. His clothes were grimy and old. He was unarmed, and cowered, visibly scared of the warriors.

“Ask him his name,” said Mancas, not needing to specify that his order was aimed at me.

I asked him in the tongue of the Norse and the old man sucked his teeth and peered at me as though I was far away, even though I was only a few paces from him.

“You are not from these parts, are you?” he said.

He had surely been observing us for some time, and must have heard us talking in Englisc. Perhaps he had even watched us arrive on Brymsteda. I didn’t feel that such an obvious question deserved an answer, so I shook my head and repeated my question to him.

“My name is—”

Before he could finish, Runolf shouted out in his booming voice, “Audun, can it be you? Can you truly be alive, when everyone else is dead?”

Runolf had come running back up the hill at the sound of the man’s arrival and now stood beside me once more, a look of amazement on his features.

The old man squinted at the sound of this new voice. Then a broad smile cracked his wrinkled face.