Conquest

He remembered the stories Aidan the Priest had told him as a child of the many historic battles between the Saxons and the Danes. It struck him again how unsettled his native land had been, as its many different peoples vied for supremacy. That struggle continued. The great battle at Hereford had shown only too clearly that, under Gruffydd’s forceful leadership, the Welsh tribes were a formidable force. The Scandinavian kings in Norway and Denmark still had designs on the throne of England, which was also drifting ever closer to Normandy, a dukedom with which King Edward had strong ties.

As a boy, Hereward had assumed that life in the England he knew would always be stable and settled. Now he realized that many forces were at work; his homeland had a precarious future. As the ship sailed on, he occasionally looked back towards his native soil.

Would he ever return?

Was it his destiny to play a part in the turmoil to come?

Torfida suddenly put an end to Hereward’s introspection by handing him the Talisman. ‘You should take this now.’

‘So this is what your father talked of — the thing that made Gruffydd tremble and contemplate his future.’

‘My father told me that it has made many men question not only their future, but also their past.’

‘Is it supposed to frighten me?’

‘Does it?’

‘No.’

‘Then you have your answer.’

‘Gruffydd said it had special powers.’

‘Its power lies in what men think of it.’

Hereward examined it, slowly turning it against the light of the moon. ‘It is the face of the Devil, in what looks like amber. But how can it have the Devil’s face in it, with those little creatures? And is that a splash of blood?’

‘I don’t know. My father said that the ancients believed it to be the blood of the Saviour, spilled by him on the cross, and that it holds the Devil at bay by trapping him in the stone.’

‘But why did your father think it important for us?’

‘He believed that the Talisman was like a key to wisdom, and that only great men could understand its message.’

‘That still doesn’t explain its importance for us.’

‘The Talisman has always had a messenger. You are now the envoy; you must carry the Talisman until you find the leader who should wear it.’

‘How do you know all this?’

‘When I was young, my father told me that I was destined to meet the man who would be the messenger of the Talisman and that he would stand at the right hand of kings, be their chosen warrior and lead their armies in battle. The Talisman would become a symbol of trust between the messenger and his lord, a private bond of companionship. You are that man. I know this as my father did; that’s why he sent you to me. He told me that I would need to guide the messenger, that we would complement one another and that together we would succeed in fulfilling our destinies. I understand that now. You know my strengths and my weaknesses, and I know yours. My love for you grows every day. I will be at your side for ever — in spirit, if not in flesh.’

‘Your father has been right about everything so far. I would be foolish to doubt him, but all I want for us at the moment is a settled and peaceful life in Ireland.’

‘A peaceful life is not your destiny. You will become a great warrior; everyone can see it in you. A peaceful life is not my destiny either. I am the guide to a man whose strength and skill will allow us to carry the Talisman to a leader who is worthy of it.’

‘Did your father know where the Talisman came from and why he was entrusted with it?’

‘It was given to him by Queen Emma, the mother of King Edward. Even during his long years in the forest, the Queen found ways of getting messages to him. Early one morning, when I was eleven years old, we heard a mounted housecarl from her private retinue in the distance. He had been sent to summon my father to Queen Emma’s deathbed at the monastery of Glastonbury. That’s when she gave him the Talisman. She said that England would soon face a great turning point in its history, when men would fight for the kingdom. Although a Norman herself, she loved her adopted home and its mixed blood and hoped the future king, whoever he might be, would rule England with wisdom and kindness and be a worthy bearer of the ancient Talisman.

‘She said that it had been passed to her by her father, Richard I, Duke of Normandy, who had inherited it from her grandfather, William Longsword, and her great-grandfather, Rolf, the first Viking Duke of Normandy. Before that, its pedigree was illustrious. The story among the Norman aristocracy claims that it had been passed through the old Frankish kings and that it had even been worn by the great Emperor Charlemagne. Legend says that Charlemagne had been given it when he married Theodora, the daughter of Desiderio, King of Lombardy, whose family claimed descent from the emperors of Rome.’

‘And now it’s in our lowly hands on a ship bound for the edge of the world!’