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Chapters (76)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise forMATTHEW HARFFY
  3. BY MATTHEW HARFFY
  4. Title Page
  5. Copyright
  6. Dedication
  7. Maps
  8. Epigraph
  9. Contents
  10. Place Names
  11. One
  12. Two
  13. Three
  14. Four
  15. Five
  16. Six
  17. Seven
  18. Eight
  19. Nine
  20. Ten
  21. Eleven
  22. Twelve
  23. Thirteen
  24. Fourteen
  25. Fifteen
  26. Sixteen
  27. Seventeen
  28. Eighteen
  29. Nineteen
  30. Twenty
  31. Twenty-One
  32. Twenty-Two
  33. Twenty-Three
  34. Twenty-Four
  35. Twenty-Five
  36. Twenty-Six
  37. Twenty-Seven
  38. Twenty-Eight
  39. Twenty-Nine
  40. Thirty
  41. Thirty-One
  42. Thirty-Two
  43. Thirty-Three
  44. Thirty-Four
  45. Thirty-Five
  46. Thirty-Six
  47. Thirty-Seven
  48. Thirty-Eight
  49. Thirty-Nine
  50. Forty
  51. Forty-One
  52. Forty-Two
  53. Forty-Three
  54. Forty-Four
  55. Forty-Five
  56. Forty-Six
  57. Forty-Seven
  58. Forty-Eight
  59. Forty-Nine
  60. Fifty
  61. Fifty-One
  62. Fifty-Two
  63. Fifty-Three
  64. Fifty-Four
  65. Fifty-Five
  66. Fifty-Six
  67. Fifty-Seven
  68. Fifty-Eight
  69. Fifty-Nine
  70. Sixty
  71. Sixty-One
  72. Sixty-Two
  73. Author’s Note
  74. Acknowledgements
  75. About the Author
  76. An Invitation from the Publisher

Coenric is as different from Criba as steel is from cheese. I have known many men in my long life, both good and honourable, and loathsome and evil. And yet I do not recall having encountered any more Christlike in their compassion than young Coenric. I may sometimes berate him and he may not be the brightest boy in the world, but as I am sure he will read this, I would have him know that no matter my ill-temper, I know that I owe him much. I have oft been told I am a difficult man, quick to judge and fast to anger. I have clashed swords with dark-skinned Berbers in the forge-heat of Ifriqiya and pale-eyed screaming brutes in the snowy wastes of the north, sailed in Runolf’s great ship to lands beyond anything most men can imagine. I have walked the shadowed streets of Byzantion, and traversed the swollen rivers of the Baltic. It is not easy for one who has lived such a life to accept aid from anyone. But I am old now, and I know that Death has his skeletal hand on my shoulder. I loathe the decrepitude that has wrapped itself around me like a sodden cloak. I rail against the grip of time and the approach of my end, but I am not insensible of Coenric’s sacrifice these last weeks. And I am thankful for his patience and his ministrations.

One grey drizzled day, when the ache in my guts had been made distant by the cunning woman’s brew, I asked Coenric why he endured my poor humour and barbed words.

“Why, to make you well again, so that you can write the next volume of your annals,” he said, seemingly genuinely surprised by my question.

I looked out the small window at the leaden sky and listened to the constant drip of the rain from the building’s eaves. The smell of smoke, perhaps from the forge or a cooking fire, came to me on the breeze. The weather and the smoke sent me instantly back to that day long ago, when Skorri and his Norsemen brought chaos and death to Werceworthe, and my life changed forever.

I had not imagined that Coenric had read what I had been working on all those months. Clearly, he had not divulged my secrets to Criba, who still enquired regularly whether I would be well enough to continue with my transcription of the Vita Sancti Wilfrithi.