Part 8
As soon as Renweard had gone, Osred came down from his chair on the dais and held a cup to Eulalia’s lips. “Have a drink, Aelf,” he said, using her Saxon name. “I don’t expect your master is planning any refreshment for you.” Eulalia drank the ale he offered gratefully. Her throat was still parched from running and she’d had nothing to eat or drink since running away the previous night.
“What do you think, Aelf?” Osred said, when she’d emptied the cup. “Will Renweard be a good husband for my cousin Hwita? Will he treat her gently on their wedding night? As gently he did you?”
Much as she wanted to tell him to go to hell, Eulalia said nothing. Tied to the pillar, blindfold and helpless, she reasoned the less she said that might annoy the Ealdorman, the better. Osred took her breasts in both hands and squeezed, pressing his fingers into the barely healed wounds left by the fish hooks. Eulalia breathed deep and bit her lip, trying not to cry out.
“She has only herself to blame,” Osred continued. “I would’ve had her, but she wasn't interested. You shouldn’t marry your cousin, her father said. Pious shit. Then he sent her away. How about you, Aelf? I could buy you back from Renweard and make you my wife. He won’t need you, when he’s got Hwita to fuck.”
The sound of Renweard and the other men on their way back to the hall sent Osred scurrying to the safety of his male friends and his ale. Eulalia didn’t want to think about the misery that would face Hwita as Renweard’s wife and Osred’s threat only reminded her how precarious her own future was. She heard something large and heavy being dragged into the hall and left nearby. Then she heard Renweard’s voice and felt his breath on her face.
“Open your mouth, slave,” Renweard snarled. He held her nose till she was forced to comply and then something metal slid onto her tongue, pressing it down. A metal bit followed, forced in and lodged between her teeth, secured by a strap buckled behind her head. She was untied from the post and pushed through an opening. She felt a cold metal plate under her feet, as her wrists were pulled up and tied to another ring. Something metal clanged, she guessed the door of the cage and then she had a feeling of going up, the floor swaying under her feet and the sound of a chain being pulled over a wooden beam.
Renweard looked up at Eulalia, standing in the cage, which was swaying and turning gently in the rafters of the hall. “Leave her up there,” he said, “till the evening, when there’s more people here and the fire is hot. Then we’ll bring her down and see if she can dance.”
Eulalia’s first instinct was panic. She wanted to scream, but the gag, with its tongue depressor, prevented anything more than anguished shrieks. Kicking out brought her feet into contact with the vertical metal bars of the cage and made it swing alarmingly. She felt with her fingers for a knot she could undo to release her hands, but all she found was cord wound several times through the ring, and above that was just a chain.
“Evening...” she’d heard Renweard say. That meant standing for hours with her arms raised above her head. More hours without food or drink. And then they planned to lower the cage onto the fire, till the plate under her feet became red hot. She remembered the heat of the brand and shuddered.
Eulalia spent most of the afternoon, so far as she could tell, alone. By the time she heard voices and the sound of logs being dumped to build up the fire under the cage, her shoulders were racked with cramp and she could barely feel her hands. She had explored the boundaries of her confinement as far as she could; the cage was round with vertical bars and at least one horizontal band to keep them in place. With an effort she could get her feet up onto the band, but the position was not much more comfortable than pulling her legs up and hanging by her wrists.
The murmur of voices became denser as more people, mostly men, came to the hall for food, drink and entertainment. There were ribald comments and insults shouted as the runaway slave hung in her cage, awaiting her punishment, but blindfold, mute and already in pain, she was hardly aware of them.
There was no command that she heard to lower the cage, just a sudden feeling of falling and the chain again running over the beam. It came to an equally sudden halt, to cries of scorn and delight from the crowd that seemed to have assembled to enjoy the spectacle. As the cage swayed and turned in its new location, Eulalia felt the metal under her feet getting warm. Gradually warm became hot and then it was too much to stand on for more than a few seconds. As she snapped back into a more conscious state, Eulalia realised what Renweard had meant about dancing. The cage floor wasn’t hot enough to burn like the brand, but the only way to make standing on it bearable was to hop inelegantly from one foot to the other.
The dance was exciting the watchers and whetting their appetite for more extreme torments, when there was an enraged scream in a female voice Eulalia knew. Having escaped from Ealdgyth’s supervision, Hwita had burst into the hall and launched herself at Renweard, beating on his chest with her fists.
“Let her go, you bastard,” Hwita cried desperately. “She’s my friend. Why do you torture her?”
If Renweard was surprised by the attack, he recovered quickly, pushing his betrothed away and following up with a stinging blow across her face. She fell to the ground, bleeding from a cut on her lip, just as her aunt hurried breathlessly into the hall.
“Take her back to the bower, Ealdgyth,” Renweard ordered, “and keep her locked up. We’ll be married in the morning and then I’ll teach her to know her place.” He turned to the men who were controlling the chain attached to the cage. “Lower the slave closer to the fire.” As the chain rattled again, her aunt’s two young attendants dragged Hwita, kicking and screaming, out of the hall.
The cage settled lower and the metal floor grew hot enough to scorch the soles of Eulalia’s feet. Dancing from one foot to another was no longer enough; the only way to help the pain would have been to draw both legs up and hang from the ring. The exhausted girl, her shoulders and arms already weakened by numbness and cramp, just didn’t have the strength. She drooped in her bonds, feeling her skin blister, and then everything went black.
When Eulalia came round, she was slumped against a wall. The gag had gone, but her eyes were still covered and her hands were tied to another ring, this time close to the floor. Her feet hurt like hell, but someone seemed to be wrapping them with cloth.
“Who’s there?” she asked.
“It’s me, Breca,” a reassuringly familiar voice answered. “Burgwynn sent me to do what I can for you. Renweard wants you kept tied up in the hall and blindfold, though, at least until the wedding’s over.”
“The wedding,” Eulalia said sadly. “Surely someone will stop it. How can Osred let his cousin marry that monster?”
“You think Osred cares? Anyway, he has no power, at least not over Renweard,” Breca said. She held a cup to her fellow slave’s lips. “Here, drink this. And then I’ll give you something to eat.”
When Breca had gone, Eulalia dozed as best she could, crumpled up against the wall. Later she was woken by male voices, but no one seemed to be taking any notice of her. She guessed that Renweard’s friends and associates were assembling to march in procession to the bower. There they would be joined by Osred, Ealdgyth and their retinue, to escort the bride to the hall, where the ceremony would take place.
The sounds that Eulalia could hear told her that the celebrations were going to plan. The groom’s party left and Renweard, who remained with a few others, took time out of his big day to come over and pull his slave by her hair. “Aren’t you going to wish me well, cunt? When I’m married to your little friend, just think how much fun we’re going to have together.” He let go of her head, aimed a bruising kick into her side and stalked off.
Now there were sounds outside of the wedding party returning. But, then Eulalia became aware of other noises that didn’t fit with her expectations. Shouts, like someone challenging for a fight, hastily shouted orders, women screaming, running feet and the distinctive clash of sword against shield, and sword against sword.
There was nothing Eulalia could do except huddle in her corner of the hall, hoping that whatever this commotion meant, it wouldn’t make things worse for her than they were already. Whoever had attacked Goltho, they had picked a time when the settlement was as unprepared for defence as it could have been. Nevertheless, the fighting sounded ferocious and the cries of wounded and dying men began to drift to Eulalia’s ears.
“Aelf! Oh, God, Aelf!” Hwita’s voice was close and then the blindfold was being unwrapped and the rope binding her wrists untied. Even the dull light of the hall seemed bright as Eulalia got used to being able to see again. The first thing she recognised was her friend, dressed for her wedding with flowers in her hair and tears in her eyes.
Crouching with her was Breca and standing behind them both was a man. Not Renweard, or Osred, or anyone else Eulalia recognised. He was tall, fair, with a kind face; smiling but full of strength and understanding.
“Aelf!” Hwita cried, standing up beside the stranger and holding onto his arm. “This is my brother Wulfric. He came back to reclaim his birthright. Osred is dead and Goltho is ours again.”
“What about Renweard?” Eulalia asked hopefully. “You cannot have married him...”
“Renweard has gone,” Wulfric replied. “He fought like a lion and, without him organising our cousin’s rabble, it would all have been over much sooner. But, he owed no real loyalty to Osred and, when he saw it was hopeless, he slipped away.”
“So now we’re both free of him,” Hwita said joyfully. “And, there’s a wedding feast to enjoy, even if there’s no wedding. It’ll be our victory feast instead. Wulfric, you’ll have to carry Aelf to the table, it’s going to be a while before she can walk.”
Wulfric wrapped Eulalia in a blanket and scooped her up in his arms. To steady herself as he strode across the hall, she put her arms round his neck and tried to steal a glance at his face, but he looked down at the same time and smiled. "You're free now, Aelf," he said. "There'll be no slaves in Goltho while I'm Ealdorman."
Aelf smiled back and laid her head on Wulfric's shoulder. It was a long time since she’d felt so happy and safe with a man.
The End.
I'd give you a hug if I could find the icon. 
gif
gif 
