Read Online Out of the Dawn Light by Alys Clare - Free Book Online

treat them all.’
    Goda looked at me with her mouth turned down in a sarcastic scowl. ‘She must be desperate if she wants a clumsy, ham-fisted oaf like you to tend the wounded,’ she observed. Then, prurient curiosity getting the better of her as I had known it would: ‘What sort of accident?’
    ‘There was a heavily loaded hay cart being drawn back to the lord’s yard and lots of people were riding on it,’ I said in a hushed tone. ‘Many more were walking along beside it and then something startled the horse – they think it may have been stung by a hornet – and somehow it put its offside feet over the edge of the ditch and before anyone could do anything the cart went over.’
    ‘Were many people hurt?’ Goda asked.
    ‘Oh, yes. Broken arms, collarbones, concussion, bad bruising. Some of the injured,’ I added, ‘were small children.’
    Even Goda could not ignore the necessity to offer all possible aid to a hurt child, could she?
    ‘It sounds bad,’ she muttered, frowning.
    It was bad. It happened just as I had described it, but it had happened more than a week ago and Edild had managed perfectly well on her own. I was told the news by the tinker who visited Icklingham. He usually went to Aelf Fen as his previous call and, knowing I came from there, often brought titbits of gossip.
    One of my cardinal rules is if you’re going to lie, make it as close to the truth as you can. In this instance, all I was altering was the timing.
    ‘Yes, awful,’ I agreed. ‘I don’t really want to go but I think I should,’ I added, frowning to express my pretended reluctance. ‘Apparently a man’s got a bone actually sticking through the flesh of his leg and Edild needs me to help her push and pull till the bones go back into their proper position, which means we’ll have to—’
    Goda had gone quite pale. ‘Yes, yes, enough!’ she said abruptly. Then, after a moment, ‘How long will you be gone?’
    ‘Oh, quite some time, I’m afraid,’ I said, my frown deepening as if I hated the very thought. ‘Perhaps as long as a week? There will be such a lot to do. You have to be so careful to keep flesh wounds clean, you see, especially in summer, what with the flies and—’
    ‘ All right! ’ bellowed my sister. She shifted in the bed and a smell of stale sweat wafted out, accompanied by the sharper stench of urine. ‘You’d better get me cleaned up if you’re going away. Then you can fetch the midwife for me – she’ll have to look after me till you get back.’
    For a moment I stood unmoving, quite taken aback at how easy it had been. Then I saw Goda flap her hand about and I realized she was searching for something to throw at me. I spun on my heel and hurried away to heat up the water and find the wash cloth.
    The sooner I was out of the house, the better. Goda clearly didn’t know yet about my forbidden excursion last night. If she had noticed my pallor and the dark circles that must surely be under my eyes – very unlikely, as the only person whose well-being concerned her was herself – she did not comment. By the time she found out what I’d been up to, I wanted to be well away from Icklingham. That morning, my sister received the swiftest, most obliging attention I had ever given her.
    Even that failed to make her smile.
     
    I had arranged to meet Romain and Sibert as dusk fell, under a spinney of beech trees that stood beside the road that led east out of Icklingham. I hurried through the rest of my appointed tasks for Goda and then, as befitted someone on an urgent healing mission, I set off north-westwards on the road to Aelf Fen.
    I walked through the neat strips of land for a couple of miles or more. Many people were out that fine morning tending their land and several of them straightened up as I passed to smile and nod a greeting. One of Goda’s neighbours was trying to turn his plough at the end of a field, cursing and swearing because the shoe was deep in a rut. He looked up, saw