‘I understand...’ Gisela said sharply, seeing the girl’s face whiten with fear as she struggled in the mud, slapping down futilely with her palms. Placing her buckets carefully on the board, Gisela took two long strides out from the plank on to the mudflat, intending to pull the child out.
‘Oh, mistress, no...!’ the boy shouted out in warning, as her feet encountered the mud. She sank, promptly, her feet disappearing, swiftly followed by her calves and knees, her body lurching forward in shock. ‘Oh, God...no!’ Gisela cried out in horror as she realised her mistake. The hem of her gown rose up around her and the thick cold mud hugged her knees, her thighs.
‘Oh, mistress, you shouldn’t have done that!’ another child said. ‘That mud is dangerous, it’ll suck you down. That’s why we use the planks. To stop us disappearing...’
Gisela let out a long, shaky breath. In her effort to reach the girl, she had forgotten. Sweat gathered beneath her linen scarf, along her neckline. She longed to rip it off and feel the cool air against her skin. Do not panic, she told herself sternly, fear bubbling treacherously in her belly. Do not. Beside her the little girl wept openly, her pinched face marred by tears and grime.
‘I will get you out of here,’ Gisela said confidently. Putting her hands beneath the child’s bony arms, she pulled and lifted, ignoring the fact that she sunk lower in the process, until she heard a satisfying sucking noise. The mud released its grip on the child’s legs; Gisela fell sideways, the child in her arms. Relief coursed through her.
‘Crawl flat on your belly over to the plank,’ she told the girl.
The child frowned at her, her sweet face doubtful. ‘But what about you, mistress?’
‘Tell someone to come for me, when you reach the shore,’ Gisela told her. ‘Find someone to help me!’ she called to the rest of the children, watching the girl slither across the mud to join them. They nodded in unison, pointing at her, then nodded again, the bedraggled group chattering in subdued voices as they made their way back along the planks.
As the wind whipped away their high-pitched voices, a gust of vulnerability, insidious and threatening, enveloped her. In this windswept barren landscape, she was completely alone, up to her thighs in mud, unable to move. Her buckets of brine sat on the wooden plank, mocking her. How long would it take for the children to send someone out? Would they even come? The salt-pan master had no care for her, he knew there was something peculiar about her, despite her rattling out the same story that her and her father and sister had all told on this journey. They were Anglo-Saxons heading north to live with relatives as the Normans had dispossessed them of all they had owned in the south. Maybe her mangled use of the English language had finally given her away.
She tried to bend forward, lying down flat on the mud, scrabbling with her hands to try to reach a clump of reeds, to try to pull herself out. The mud seeped through her gown, cold and wet against her stomach and breasts. She tugged on the grass, slowly, gradually, hoping for the smallest movement around her feet and legs, a sign that the mud was giving up its hold on her. Nothing.
To her right, the river slopped and gurgled, an ominous sound; the water spilled over the lower walls of the salt pans, starting to fill the shallow ponds. The tide was coming in quickly now. With a sickening dread, Gisela eyed the water gushing towards her. Sinking in the mud was not her only worry. Now, drowning seemed like a more likely option. Screwing her eyes up, she sought and found the figures on the shore, pale ghosts in the twilight. The children had surely reached the adults by now and were telling them to come and fetch her. Aye, that was it. As she straightened up, the thought comforted her and she kept her eyes pinned on the bleached lines of the planks, heading back to shore, squinting in the half-light for any sign of help, watching for someone, anyone, to come out to rescue her.
But then, to her utter dismay, the cluster of people by the boiling houses walked away. Not one face turned towards her! Nay, they were heading towards the Danes, newly arrived on the shore. Arms raised in welcome towards the visitors, the shouts and calls of greeting echoed out across the mudflats. Distracted by the Danes’ arrival, they had forgotten, or had not even been told about her, stuck yards out from shore in the mud. No one was coming. Panic swirled in her chest, a great flood of terror that she would die out here, her breath choked off by the incoming tide, until the air in her lungs expelled in a scream of sheer desperation. She screamed and screamed, her voice shrill and clear, waving her arms violently towards the shore, for her life depended upon it.
As the Danes jumped from the longships, calf-length leather boots splashing through the shallows, the Saxon townspeople crowded on to the strip of shingle, slapping the tall seafaring warriors on the back, shaking their hands. Smiling widely, the men accepted flagons of mead from the dark-eyed Saxon maidens, hefted steaming meat pies from passing wooden trays, eating with real appreciation. Ragnar ran an eye along the bows of the longships, making sure all vessels were drawn up high enough against the incoming tide. The six boats had carried more than two hundred men across the North Sea; Harald’s larger fleet would bring double that number in the next few days, swelling their ranks to a sizeable army to help the Saxons throw off the Norman yoke.
‘Torvald has found us an inn for the night.’ Eirik walked over to him, handing back his empty tankard to one of the Saxon maids. ‘The men can sleep in the ships, but I, for one, wouldn’t mind a comfortable mattress, as I’m sure you would.’
‘Age getting the better of you, Eirik?’ Ragnar grinned.
Eirik laughed. ‘Perhaps. I have the choice so I may as well be comfortable.’ His gaze fell on a nearby Saxon maid, her face blushing with attention as she moved deftly around the crowd with a tray of ale tankards. ‘This town is as good as any for us to spend the night.’ His mouth twisted with a rueful grin as he pushed strands of dark hair from his eyes.
‘Too bad you’re married,’ Ragnar said. The corner of his mouth quirked upwards.
‘Aye,’ Eirik said wistfully. ‘But you’re not. Sure you won’t take what’s on offer?’ He jabbed Ragnar in the ribs.
His short hair, thick golden strands, riffled in the sharpening breeze. ‘No, Eirik.’ Guilt crashed over him, black, coruscating. A flock of geese flew low over the mudflats, necks stretched out, honking wildly, and he followed their path in silence, his body gripped with regret.
‘It’s a shame.’ Eirik folded huge leather-bound arms across his chest. He looked out across the water.
It’s only what I deserve, thought Ragnar, after what had happened to Gyda. His younger sister was worsening by the day, a thin pale effigy of the maid she once had been, shrinking before his eyes, before his parents’ eyes. Her silent presence haunted his days, as she brushed past him like a ghost, or perched, mute, at the end of the table. She hadn’t spoken a word since she’d been brought back from this godforsaken land.
‘What I could never understand, though,’ Eirik continued, ‘was why Gyda decided to travel to England with Magnus in the first place? On a raiding mission, of all things.’
Because I told her to do it, thought Ragnar. By Thor, I encouraged her! I could see how much in love with Magnus she was and could see how against that love our parents were. I told her to go, that I would explain everything to our parents: Gyda and Magnus would marry in England and return to Denmark as husband and wife. All would be well. But then, suddenly, it wasn’t.
Raised voices nearby yanked Ragnar’s attention from his memories. He was thankful. He had no wish to dwell on his sister’s plight any longer than was necessary. His eyes traced the shadows, hunting out the sound of an argument. Beneath the overhanging thatch of a building, a woman tugged at a man’s tunic sleeve, a large bulky man, his