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"Look!" whispered Baldwin, nudging Ivar "Prisoners! Slaves!"

Humankind

But they weren’t slaves They wore no chains They carried arms and armor They wore leather jerkins orthe wagons marched freely within the ranks He’d seen a few of them scattered in the forward portion of the ar with the Eika Allies, not enerabbed his arons carried supplies, and Ivar would have missed the person Baldwin indicated because she was surrounded by a heavy guard of brawny Eika crowded together so tightly that they obscured the people seated in the bed of that wagon He saw their faces in flashes, living faces drawn taut with fear and exhaustion: frail Sigfrid, steadfast Eria, and brave Hathuh, beside the driver She see amiably with the tall youth, as clad in a boiled leather jerkin and no hel no horses to drive, was soon Biscop Constance sat beside Sister Eligia, in the bed of the wagon She gripped the side and stared intently into the clearing She had caught sight of Father Ortulfus amid his captors

A co the abbot The child squirted out between the legs of one of the soldiers and, grasping its rag doll, sprinted for the trees A pair of dogs scrambled after it, but their masters whistled sharply and both, wisely, turned back as the Eika soldiers laughed as the child stuo, but Father Ortulfus was tugged forward and slung uncere its pace He fell on top of Erfrid went down as well as lihted theape Father Ortulfus et to his knees He bowed over the biscop’s hand and kissed her ring Ivar was too far away to hear speech or see their faces closely, but the reunion of the biscop and the young man who had once served in her schola in Autun made him cry As Ivar wiped away tears, Baldwin eant and the others? Are they all dead?"

The areant and his coht the Eika took no person as prisoner," added Baldwin, "but only killed every soul they met"

"Even the Eikaa holy biscop Hush, now Until they’re gone"

It seemed forever until the main force marched past and vanished down the road No horses accoer afterward as several parties of outliers trotted past Ivar held his breath as dogs swar the ht up short by the stream and by the command of their masters, whowhile it was silent At length, a crow landed on the ground beyond the oak, scratched at the ground, and abruptly took wing and fluttered away

"Let’s go!" said Baldwin

Ivar put a finger to his lips just as a pair of loping scouts cas would, and ain the crow returned and this tirass, a second and third joined it

Ivar said, "we’ll go to Hersford There must be a woodsman’s path out of Hersford that will take us cross-country"

Baldwin, like the horses, was eager to ot the reins in hand and coaxed the horses out of the coppice They crossed the clearing quickly The croed at them and flapped a short distance away, but did not consider these teary travelers a threat The grassy path led them into the forest Ivar recalled no land this route those few years back; he’d even forgotten the oak at the crossroads, although such a majestic treebefore folk crept out of the forest to follow them, ere armed and who traveled with purpose In tied party, and one of them was the very Prior Ratbold who had escorted Ivar and his friends as prisoners to Autun When Ivar told him of the fate of Father Ortulfus, he e equanin of the phoenix "So was it promised to us"

Baldwin nodded

Ivar wished he possessed such faith, but he did not He was relieved to see the palisade surrounding Hersford Monastery, rather more formidable a structure than it had been when he was led away froo it had been, but the march into the east, the lost years beneath the crown, and the captivity in Queen’s Grave wove into a confounding tapestry Two years? Four years? It all blurred together