Conqueror

"'Man of gold?"'

Ambrosias reached out and tugged a lock of Wuffa's blond hair. 'Don't you people use mirrors? And as for "great king"-'

'That is what "Vortigern" means.'

'Yes! The reference is clearly to the revolt against him. So, you see, knowing that enabled my family to fix the start of the first Great Year at the date of the revolt. And then we were able to look ahead to the events foretold in the second stanza, to calculate its date. By then Isolde was already long dead, and I was not yet born. Yet the events the verse foretold came to pass, thirty-five months into the Great Year. "See the Bear laid low / by the Wolf of the north."'

Wuffa glanced at Ulf. 'Ammanius told us that "Artorius" may have been a nickname-'

'The Bear,' said Ambrosias. 'And what is the Wolf but you Germans? Why – that is your own name, Wuffa.' His watery eyes gleamed. 'And if you count up the months, the forecast date of Artorius's death was correct. Thus my prophecy holds truth. History is the proof of it – the proof!'

Wuffa felt uncommonly afraid. A practical man, he was not accustomed to thinking deeply on such mystical issues. It was only chance that he had run into the bishop in Lunden, chance that had brought the two of them here – but chance that seemed to have been predicted centuries ago. And yet, he saw, if he could take all this in, there could be advantage to be gained.

But surely the same thought had occurred to Ulf, his rival.

Ulf got to the point. 'And what next? What does the prophecy say of the future?'

Trembling now, Ambrosias raised his document, but it seemed he knew the words by heart:

The Comet comes/in the month of March.

The blood of the holy one/thins and dries.

Empire dreams pour/into golden heads…

Again Wuffa was baffled. 'What does it mean?'

'Why, don't you see? The blood of the holy one thins and dries… Dreams pour into golden heads… Isolde's blood is drying in my old veins; I am the last of her line. But you are here, with your golden heads, to be filled with the dream and to carry it forward. I knew this night would come. Even when my family abandoned me here, I knew all I had to do was to stay and wait for the Second Great Year to elapse, for those nine hundred and eighteen months to wear away, wait for the comet to reappear. For these words, uttered by an ignorant young woman in labour two centuries ago, are describing our meeting – right now, here, tonight. And now my sole remaining duty is to pass the prophecy to you. Isn't it marvellous?' And he clutched the prophecy to his chest. He seemed to be trying not to weep. Wuffa saw that these brief moments were in some way the fulfilment of his whole life.

Ulf said, practically, 'We ca

Ambrosias replied, 'You can remember, can't you? You people are famous for your sagas, your long dreary poems. I hear them floating up from the village on the night air, though I thank Sol Invictus that I don't understand a word. You will remember, and teach your own children, who will teach theirs. Thus the prophecy will be passed down your families until such time as even you Outer Germans learn the benefit of literacy. My time is at an end – my life, my family – even Brita

'But what's the point of all this?' Wuffa asked quietly. 'What of the far future? What does your calendar say of destiny?'

Ambrosias's eyes were huge. 'There will be a great crisis,' he said. 'At the close of the eighth Great Year.'

Wuffa said, 'And when is that?'

'Who can say? My grandfather once tried to add up all the months in the Menologium, and divide by twelve and so forth, but everybody knows you can't do figuring with numbers above a few hundred.'

'But it will be centuries from now-'

'Oh, yes! More than four hundred years, my grandfather believed.

The whole world will tremble, north pitted against south. But a hero will emerge, and with the love of his brother he will win an empire. And then the future will be shaped by the will of his children – of yours – and they will call themselves Aryans. An Aryan empire. This is his plan.'

'Whose?'

'The Weaver's. The spi

XI

Wuffa, on a straw pallet, reluctantly sharing the floor of Ambrosias's kitchen with Ulf, found it difficult to sleep.

And when he did doze he dreamed of centuries, stretching around him like a vast firelit hall.

He imagined the power the Menologium might give him and his family. But he was afraid. Were even gods meant to know the future? Could it be that all this was an elaborate trap set by Loki – a trap he had walked into that day when he had gone breaking windows in a haunted city?

He dreamed of Ambrosias's fine, ruined face, his wrinkled neck, the drone of his voice as he pounded his Menologium into their heads. And he imagined wrapping his hands around that scrawny neck, choking the last life out of the old man who had inflicted this prophetic curse on Wuffa and his descendants.

He was woken by a scream.

It was a grey dawn. He glimpsed Ulf hurrying out of the door. He pushed out of his bed and rushed to follow.

The scream had been the bishop's. Wuffa found him in the triclinium, with Sulpicia. They were both in their night clothes, and at another time Wuffa might have been distracted by the glimpses of Sulpicia's ankles and calves, her bare arms. But Ulf was here too, glowering. The light from the open door was dim, blue-grey.

On the floor lay Ambrosias, Last of the Romans. His body looked oddly at peace, his arms by his sides. But his head was at an impossible angle, and purple bruises showed on his throat.

Wuffa smelled burning. He saw ashes around one of Ambrosias's animal-fat lamps on a low table, the remnants of a burnt parchment.

Bishop Ammanius, his battered nose livid, shook with rage. 'To have come all this way, for this!… It is obvious what has happened here. The old man read his prophecy to you two last night. Don't bother to deny it. I heard him, though I could not make out the words. And now one of you has come back, destroyed the parchment, and murdered this wretch – one of you has sought to steal the prophecy for himself. To think that I recruited you when I saw you save one old man, only for it to end like this, in the murder of another at your own hands.'

Wuffa looked at Ulf, who returned his gaze steadily. So, Wuffa thought, the only traces of Isolde's Menologium left in the world existed in their two heads. He had expected his rivalry with Ulf to last a lifetime. Now, he sensed, it was a rivalry that might last centuries. He shivered, as if the hall of time was opening up around him.

'And perhaps you have murdered the last man alive who knew Artorius. What a crime!' Ammanius glared at them, from one to the other. 'Which of you was it? Which of you?'

Wuffa was no killer. But he remembered his fragmentary dreams. He said truthfully, 'I don't know.'