The Last Wife of Attila the Hun Read online

  “When I told him this, he shook with rage. He could get used to the idea of giving up the war sword, but to know that the brothers would bask in the glory of his acquisition was too much for him. He was set on returning, now to kill the brothers who would do this to him. I begged him not to go. He went. He was killed.”

  I hung my head and waited. At length, Edeco spoke, “How did you come to learn of his death?”

  I lifted my face so that he could see the tears that had sprung to my eyes. “I knew because I knew. I had foreseen the event in the fire, and I saw it again later, on the walls of my cave as I lay thinking of Sigurd and wishing him back by my side. I knew, but I was numb with sorrow, and for a long time I did nothing. Then, more recently, I came across a tribe of Thuets, Alans, who were traveling to the Western Empire. They spent one night in my cave, and the one who had a harp sang the song of the war sword as he had learned it from the Burgundian brothers.

  “I set them right of course, and they promised they would sing the true version thereafter. And when they were gone, I made my plan. I found my way to Burgundian lands, and, at night, when I felt certain that all within were sleeping, I entered the hall of the brothers and found the sword—no difficult task. You saw yourself how the thing catches light in a way which only an enchanted thing may do. The proud brothers had not even thought to hide it. It was there on the wall above the high seat. I took it down noiselessly, and as soon as it was in my hands, I felt how it was thirsty for blood, how it was made to be sated. You know this, too! I saw your face when you touched the thing! It was all I could do to hold myself back from taking it up against the brothers and the woman as well. But I understood also that this sword, Wodan’s war sword, was meant to cut down armies, not a few insignificant Thuets who would suffer a greater loss than life when they learned the thing was gone. I stole a horse. I rode feverishly. You know the rest.”

  I sat back on my heels and drained the rest of the wine from my cup. I could feel Edeco’s eyes on me, burning with wonder. I was burning, too, with pride and something more. I had imparted my tale with vigor. It differed from the one that I had rehearsed with my brothers before my departure, yes, but it was no less a marvel. I had not meant to mention the Burgundians by name, and I could not think why I had done so, but I did not see how it would matter one way or another. And most of all, in spite of all my fabrications, I had managed to be true, or nearly so, to Sigurd. His name and his glory were secure, even here, in the City of Attila.

  I set down the wine cup and glanced at the doorway, graced now by the lower edge of the descending sun. The light pouring in was golden.

  “Why Attila?” Edeco asked softly.

  I was prepared for the question. “Have you heard nothing?” I exclaimed, falling forward and planting my palm on Edeco’s knee. “I grew up in the forest alone, living on what I could steal! I stayed here and there, yes, but only for short periods of time, and not one of those I stayed with ever loved me or considered me one of his own. And, in truth, I preferred my aloneness, until I met Sigurd. Only then did I come to learn what it means to walk in the shadow of a great man, to be called friend by someone whose powers are equal to my own!

  “Sigurd is dead, and I will never love a man that way again. But I have come here to seek the company of another great man, to lend my powers to a man who is, perhaps, in his own way, even greater than Sigurd. And I have brought with me the thing which only a great man may possess, the likes of which would cause chaos in the hands of a lesser man.”

  I jumped to my feet and tossed aside the skins as carelessly as Edeco had earlier. I reached into the sack, and spilling straw everywhere, pulled forth the war sword and held it up by the hilt. When I turned with it, the hot red orb of the sun was lower yet, filling the space now between the top of the doorway and the high palisade beyond it. And thus the sword became a torch in my hand, a wild, flashing thing which put the sun’s light to shame. Edeco, who had bounded to his feet as well, abandoned his pretense of indifference now and let his mouth drop open. He drew back and shielded his eyes from the sword’s fierce glare. Was it an accident, I wondered in my boldness, that the sun had chosen this moment to set? I had seen that it was setting, but I had made nothing of it; I had not planned to retrieve the sword. Again the warm honey scent permeated the little hut, and I fancied that it was Sigurd who had compelled me to take up the sword at just that instant.

  My triumph made me giddy. I heard myself laughing wickedly, as the valkyria Brunhild might have done. In response, Edeco’s expression became even more bewildered, his bright blue eyes darting feverishly from me to the sword to the sun and around again. I felt his fear, his awe. I watched, amused, as he struggled to strike an attitude. His eyes still dancing, he brought his hand up from his side and growled, “Give it to me.”

  I drew back. “I will give it only to Attila.”

  “I will give it to him for you. You have my word,” he said more gently. “Give it to me. I do not want to have to hurt you.”

  I laughed in his face, for as I had the sword, the notion was absurd. But the guard, who had halted his horse to learn the cause of the commotion, had seen the thing now, too. I lowered the sword and handed it to Edeco. He took it up as if it were a fragile thing. The guard saw the exchange and began, reluctantly it seemed, to pace again.

  “Attila returns tomorrow,” Edeco said, his gaze sweeping along the length of the sword. “I will keep the sword until then. I will tell him all that you have told me. I have no doubt that he will send for you.” He gestured for the sack.

  As soon as he was gone, I spread out the skin I had slept on earlier. I was anxious to see Sigurd again, to discuss with him what I had said and done, if only in a dream. His scent was still heavy in the hut; I had no doubt that his phantom would still be available to me. I lay down and closed my eyes, but my mind was racing, and I could not fall asleep. In spite of my efforts to empty my mind, it bustled with my image, with the way I had spoken, the way I had planted my hand on the Thuet-Hun’s knee, the way I had pulled forth the sword and held it up, as if to silence the setting sun.

  I saw myself over and over again as I imagined I had looked to Edeco, a small, thin woman laughing sardonically and holding light itself in her grasp. My only regret was that my audience had not been Attila. I marveled at how evil I had become, at how much I had enjoyed my wicked charade.

  But the evening progressed, and, gradually, my conceit was shaded by another perspective. I had drunk from the same cup as my enemy. I had laid my hand on him as if he were a brother. I had despised the Huns all my life, and yet I had spent a time conversing with one—for he was a Hun in mind if not in blood—and it had never once entered my thoughts that this Hun, this Thuet who was a Hun, might well have been in Worms when the blood of my people flowed like a river. When I had held the sword up to the sun, I had felt an impulse to strike Edeco with it, but not because he was my enemy. The truth was more that in holding the thing, I had felt myself an extension of it—and thus had been overcome with an urge to experience its power.

  The night was slipping by. I could sense the sun yearning to rise again, and still sleep evaded me. The honey scent was gone now, and I wondered whether I had only imagined it earlier. What force had caused me to mention the Burgundians like that? Would it really make no difference? I had taken some pleasure in marking my brothers as villains. How was that possible? I had even taken pleasure in tainting myself.

  Perhaps it was not madness after all that had made me feel so emboldened, so oblivious, so giddy—all feelings that eluded me now as cunningly as sleep. Perhaps, I thought, the curse had found a way to reach me. Since the time I had first received the sword from Gunner’s hand, I had amused myself by thinking that I was too good, too much a true Burgundian, to be contaminated. Now I wondered. Now I was ashamed.

  I crawled into the corner and trembled with humiliation. I felt alone, afraid, as if I were a marmot without a
tunnel on hand, separated from its colony by time and space and allegiance. I was sick with longing for Sigurd, and I tried with all my being to conjure up his presence again, to detect once more his honey scent. But I smelled nothing but my own fear. And soon I came to suspect that the illusion of Sigurd’s presence, like the illusion of my valor, which had been building for days and days, had been yet another trick of the sword. I was sick with fear and self-loathing. I gagged but could not vomit. And when I had spent myself and finally fell asleep, I dreamed of nothing.

  2

  HUMBLED NOW BY the knowledge that the source of my former powers had been outside myself, I did not much care when Edeco failed to come for me the next day, nor on the one after that. I was determined to use the time to summon up a new force, this time from within. To encourage myself, I invented various scenarios in which I met with Attila, and I wondered which one would most resemble the real event. But another day passed, and then another, and still I was not summoned. How many days passed in all I could not tell because after nine or so, I lost count—or rather I gave up counting in an effort to deny my despair.

  I need not have bothered; with or without my consideration of the passing time, my despair had plenty enough to feed on. The meals that were brought twice daily became increasingly meager, until they consisted of no more than a crust of bread and a bowl of water. The various Hun women who brought them hurried in and out, taking no time to concern themselves with the steady progression of my emaciation. Nor was I given a taper, and thus, except for those brief moments when the curtain was pulled aside to admit my indifferent attendants, I had no light, no company, no distraction other than the endless movement of the guard on horseback outside my prison.

  Now, to stave off madness—which no longer seemed desirable to me—I made a game of recalling all those events which had brought me to the region called Pannonia. This enabled me, for a time, to hold on to some vestige of my identity and purpose. I realized all too keenly, as the days crept by, how easy it would be to drift back into the less painful but infinitely more insidious prison—where time was suspended and events were devoid of meaning—in which I had spent two long years of my life. But the events I summoned to stabilize myself, like the scenes I envisioned with Attila, began themselves to lose their meaning after a time, and I felt myself slipping in spite of my efforts. I could no longer stand to live alone within my own mind! I ached for work, for something to do with my hands. I pulled hairs from my head for days on end and braided them together until I had made a fine, thin chain the length of the hut. But the futility of this labor discouraged me, and eventually I gave it up. I ached to be able to hasten the time through slumber, but I could sleep only sporadically. And even here I was afforded no diversion, for my dreams were those of shadows and silence. I tried to pray, but I had no sense that the gods could hear me. I tried to imagine my brothers’ faces, hopeful as they had been when I had last seen them, but I saw only my own face in my mind’s eye, and how audaciously I had gone about making Gunner and Hagen colleagues in my quest. I tried to imagine my dear child’s face, but its sweet features became increasingly inaccessible. I began to suspect that I would never be sent for, that I would be forced to live out my days thus, in bleak isolation on foreign, godless lands. And so, with my regrets and the recollection of my folly alone unfaded in my mind, I came after all to desire what had previously seemed the less desirable of the two prisons—the dark abyss where thought and hope and emotion are strangers. I hovered near its entrance, but even here I failed to gain admittance.

  One day I heard the curtain being drawn, but not the quick footsteps that usually followed, and I knew that Edeco had finally come. I was curled up in the corner with my face to the wall, covered with more skins than the cooling weather warranted. Several moments passed before I could bring myself to look in his direction. He had left the curtain open behind him so that the daylight poured in and scorched my eyes. “You failed to keep your word,” I croaked. My voice was the voice of an old woman, unused since his last visit.

  “Attila is a busy man,” Edeco mumbled.

  My eyes had still not adjusted to the light. I could see his shape, but not his face. “Too busy to see the woman who brought him the war sword?” I asked bitterly.

  “You are bold to speak so,” Edeco responded.

  Yes, I was bold, but not because I suddenly felt enlivened with spirit and purpose. Rather, I felt so vague and shapeless, so weak in mind and body, so close to death, even eager for it, that I no longer cared what I said or how I said it. It was a wonder that I’d had the wits to recall the war sword at all. Certainly it had been some time since I had thought of it. I had referred to it as one refers to a thing in a dream, pointlessly. I turned back to the wall and pulled the skins closer around my head.

  “Get up,” Edeco said. “I will take you to Attila now.”

  His voice was gentle, and it stirred an emotion in me. What right had he to speak to me so kindly when he had left me alone to wallow in darkness, to grope for sensibility amid my own stinking thoughts? I turned to look at him once more. I could see him now. He loomed over me. In his bright eyes I saw his pity, and also his disgust. I was disgusting. I was an animal. His neglect had made one of me. My hair was matted. My body was wet and stinking beneath my cover of equally stinking skins. “You must get up,” Edeco declared. “If you feel you cannot manage it, I will have the guard come in and help you.”

  “Go away,” I muttered, but Edeco remained, looking down patiently. After some moments I threw off the skins and slowly uncurled my stiff limbs. As I turned over onto my stomach, I saw the last meal that had been brought in. Except for the flies, it had not been touched. I could not remember the last time I had taken the trouble to eat. Shakily, I got to my knees. Edeco’s bejeweled arm shot out to aid me, but I withdrew from it, preferring to fall. His arm followed the course of my descent, and I noticed that his palm was red and badly blistered. I gathered what saliva I could in my parched mouth and spat into it. His fingers stiffened and then curled slowly over my spittle. As if we both were curious to see what the clenched fist would do, neither of us moved for a moment. At length it withdrew.

  “Get up, Ildico,” he said again.

  His resolution infuriated me. I got to my feet and stood a moment, considering my dizziness and staring at his burned hand as it came up to take my shoulder and steer me toward the doorway. Outside, I closed my eyes against the blazing sun. I reeled, but this time I did not balk when Edeco caught me. When I regained balance, I nodded, and, leading his horse, Edeco steered me around the back of the hut. I was startled to see, in the distance, the village life taking place. I had forgotten about the village and the villagers. I had forgotten the look of the place, the endless sky, the restless grasses stained with huts, the high wooden palisades. Edeco held onto my elbow and we approached the scene slowly. It seemed imaginary, insubstantial. Still, as we grew nearer I lowered my head, ashamed, even among my enemies, to be seen as I was.

  We moved past Attila’s palisade toward the one that surrounded it, through which I had come on my first day. It seemed to take forever to reach it, and I fancied that I heard snickers and mocking exclamations from the people we passed on the way. When we arrived at the gate, Edeco turned his horse over to a guard. Then the gate was opened and we entered the tunnel-like chamber that led to the world beyond. I wondered whether I would be set free now—or rather, turned lose, without horse or weapon or food or water, to fend for myself for as long as I was able. After my long imprisonment, I would have welcomed the opportunity to walk in freedom until I collapsed. But midway through the tunnel, Edeco turned me into one of its several tributaries and led me to the wooden door at its end. He rapped once and the door was quickly lifted, revealing, beyond it, a large stone bathhouse beneath a wooden roof. The woman who had lifted the door stepped back to permit us passage. There were four others within, two at each side of the pool, all of whom bowed low to Edec
o.

  Edeco snapped his fingers and one of the women rushed over. She turned me toward her and began to pull at the broaches that held my robe together. The others rushed up behind her, as if they would all take part in the effort. I pushed the first woman’s hand aside and turned to Edeco, crying, “Do you intend to watch me bathe?”

  “You are not to be left unguarded,” he said flatly.

  “You can wait out there!” I pointed to the door.

  My manner caused a stir among the women, a few of whom began to laugh behind cupped hands. I had forgotten the sound of laughter. I turned to stare at them.

  Edeco whispered harshly into my ear, “You are not to speak to me that way.”

  It cheered me to see Edeco on the verge of abandoning his feigned patience. In the hope of pushing him further, I cried, “Where do you imagine I will get to?”

  His eyes flashed. “Attila would not have you speak to anyone.”

  I spread my arm to take in the women. “Is there anyone here who would understand me?”

  “There are many ways to make oneself understood,” Edeco replied crossly. He took hold of my arm and jerked me toward the waiting attendants. I waved them away and quickly undid the broaches myself.

  In a moment I was naked. My haggard body caused more snickers among the women, and I turned to see whether Edeco was likewise amused. Though the set of his lips revealed his persisting anger, he was looking aside, seemingly concerned with some small flaw in his riding whip. I accepted the soap which one of the women offered and lowered myself into the pool, which was warm and large enough to swim in. I ignored Edeco’s presence after I saw that he would continue to ignore mine and took my time about my bath. My pleasure in the bath was enormous. And I was glad to be among other human beings—even if they were Huns—people to know, if not to care, whether I lived or died.