The man could not help asking, “My lord, were you injured fighting the Vikings?” “Yes,” Adrian replied.
“I encountered three of them in the valley, killed two, and fell into a mountain stream.” The old man beside them had been listening quietly.
He tightened his grip on his oak staff and whispered a few words into the man’s ear, after which the man nodded and hurried into the house.
A short while later, he returned carrying a wooden tray.
On it lay half a loaf of rye bread and a small piece of dry, hardened cheese.
The edges of the cheese had already yellowed, and fine cracks covered its surface, as though it had been stored for a long time because the villagers could not bear to eat it.
The man placed the tray on the stone beside Adrian’s feet.
“My lord,” he said in a low voice, “the village chief’s son was taken away by the baron’s men last year.
They said he was being sent to defend Mercia against the invading pagans, but he never returned.” Adrian fell silent.
Defending against the pagans.
Conscripted serfs were usually handed sharpened wooden stakes and placed at the very front of the battle line.
When the Vikings charged, they were the first to die.
The fortunate ones had their skulls split by an axe and died instantly.
The unfortunate ones were struck in the shoulder or leg, left writhing in the mud while both allies and enemies trampled over them, screaming until their voices failed with no one willing to listen.
No one knew which fate had befallen the village chief’s son.
Adrian also took note of the man’s words.
He lifted his head from the tree trunk and looked at him.
“Is this Mercia?” The man seemed surprised by the question.
“Yes, my lord.
This is the Kingdom of Mercia, within Baron Bolton’s territory.” After a brief pause, he added, “The people of Blackthorn Village have farmed the baron’s land for generations.” Mercia.
Adrian had traveled south from Northumbria, crossing mountains and rivers along the way.
Heaven only knew how far the current had carried him, but somehow he had already crossed the border.
He was now standing on Mercian soil, within the domain of a baron whose name he had never even heard before.
The land had not yet been trampled by Viking longships, but Adrian knew nothing about the man who ruled it.
He glanced toward the dirt road at the village entrance.
It stretched southward, crossed a mountain pass, and vanished into the gray twilight.
Following it would likely take him toward Baron Bolton’s castle.
A wandering knight without land could simply approach the gates of an unfamiliar baron and offer his sword.
The lord might welcome him inside—or order someone to drive him away.
Until Adrian understood what sort of man Baron Bolton was, he could not afford to take that road blindly.
“Baron Bolton,” he said quietly, almost to himself, “how does he treat wandering knights?” The man opened his mouth, then closed it again.
“My lord, we only work the land,” he answered, his voice even lower than before.
“We do not dare inquire into the baron’s affairs.” That meant either he did not know, or he knew but dared not speak.
A serf’s refusal to discuss his lord did not come from loyalty, but from fear—fear of saying the wrong thing, of the words reaching the wrong person, or of bringing disaster upon himself and the entire village.
Such fear was not born naturally.
It had been taught to them again and again.
Adrian did not press him further.
Instead, he tilted his chin toward the southern road.
“Where does this road lead?” “My lord, if you follow it south and cross two ridges, you’ll reach a market town,” the man replied, speaking more quickly now, as though relieved to receive a question he could answer.
“Baron Bolton’s castle lies another day and a half south of the town.
A main road outside the castle leads west to Worcester and east to Lincoln.” Worcester.
Lincoln.
The two names immediately stirred something in Adrian’s memories.
Worcester was an important settlement in western Mercia, while Lincoln was a major city to the east.
A baron positioned along such a route would probably be cautious toward wandering knights.
A lord like that would constantly weigh who entered and left his territory—who was a merchant, who might be a spy, who could prove useful, and who might become a threat.
It also meant, however, that this area lay among the mountains northeast of Nottingham, nominally guarding the northeastern approach into Mercia.
Yet Baron Bolton’s castle was still several days away.
The region was remote enough that tax collectors likely visited only once a year and even Viking scouts would have little reason to search it.
There were only seven or eight households, a handful of collapsing thatched huts, and a few poor fields scraped from between the rocks.
No blacksmith.
No mill.
Not even enough wealth to use salt freely.
A place like this was too insignificant for its lord to care about.
But remoteness also had its advantages.
A place that no one cared about was a good place to hide people.
An idea began to take shape in Adrian’s mind.
He could establish a settlement here in secret and take in the vagrants fleeing south from the north.
The riverbank where he had awakened was suitable.
A mountain ridge to the north blocked the wind, a forest lay to the south, and between them stretched a flat area of perhaps twenty or thirty acres.
A shallow river crossed the middle of the land, reaching only to his calves and remaining clear enough for him to see the pebbles beneath the water.
There were mountains, forest, and running water.
There would be no shortage of timber or fresh water.
Once the trees were cut and the stones cleared away, the ground could be cultivated.
A wandering knight could carve out a place for himself in these neglected mountains without becoming the baron’s vassal or anyone else’s subordinate.
He could clear the fields, build the houses, and shelter those fleeing the Viking attacks in the north.
Even if someone later investigated, he could justify what he had done.
The land belonged to Mercia, that was true.
But if Vikings invaded, neither the baron’s soldiers nor the king’s army would necessarily be able to protect it.
Once seized and defiled by pagans, it would effectively become abandoned land.
Whoever reclaimed it would be recovering lost territory for God.
At that point, Adrian would no longer be merely a wandering knight without a fief.
He would be a holy warrior reclaiming land that had fallen into pagan hands.
The idea felt so promising that he wanted to turn around immediately, return to the riverbank, cut down the trees, till the ground, and begin building.
He looked at the man standing before him.
Gray hair.
Thin wrists.
Dirt packed beneath his fingernails.
The man had fed him two bowls of porridge and allowed his wife’s finest shirt to be torn into bandages.
“What is your name?” The man blinked in surprise.
“Blazer, my lord knight.
My name is Blazer.” Adrian nodded and raised his right hand, pointing toward the path from which he had come, through the forest and beyond the mountain stream.
“There is a riverbank in that direction.
A ridge lies to the north, a forest to the south, and a small river runs between them.” Blazer followed the direction of his finger, though nothing could be seen in the twilight except gray treetops beneath an even grayer sky.
“If you ever need protection, come to that riverbank and find me,” Adrian said, lowering his hand back to the hilt of his sword.
“I will act.” Blazer’s mouth fell open.
A wounded wandering knight sat beneath a dead tree at the edge of the village, having eaten two bowls of porridge with strips of linen wrapped around his shoulder, and calmly promised that anyone in need of protection could seek him out.
Yet this knight had killed two Vikings, fallen into a mountain ravine, and still managed to walk here alive.
“Thank you for your mercy, my lord,” Blazer said, his voice trembling slightly as he bowed.
No one cared about a village like theirs.
The baron would not come to defend them, and neither would the king.
If Vikings arrived, the villagers would be left to hide and survive on their own.
To them, the promise of protection from a knight capable of defeating several Vikings carried more weight than the baron’s tax collectors or the king’s decrees.