“Soren!”
A voice rumbled from outside, jolting Soren into the present. He awoke with a gasp that escaped his throat, and then he lay completely still as if he was still asleep. He stared into the dark as remains of his nightmare clung to him like cobwebs he couldn’t brush off. As he arose, his breath came in short ragged gasps. His pulse quickened, each beat echoing in his ears. The air was thick and heavy, leaving a dense odour in its wake. His sheets were twisted around his legs, damp with sweat as he tugged at them with trembling hands. His feet touched the floor and a chill bit him like a thousand needles that dug and scraped.
Soren always dressed before dawn, as he did every morning. He moved around his cellar slowly, almost reverently as he dressed himself.
First came the habit, a simple robe of coarse, undyed wool. It was rough and scratched his skin, but he did not mind. The robe was heavy and long, reaching his ankles. He had worn the robe for years, and the wool was thinning, mainly at the elbows. Then he reached for his rope belt. He tied it around his waist as he wandered the familiar walls of his cell. Soren lifted his cowl, a hooded shawl that draped across his shoulders and smelt faintly like the sea air that always soaked his clothes. Finally, he stepped into his simple leather sandals and pushed open the wooden door. The stuffy atmosphere gave way for the refreshing breeze of the sea as Soren gulped the sea laden air.
He murmured a quick prayer of gratitude before stepping into the monastery. The monastery was quiet in the sacred hour, filled only with rustling of robes and the shuffle of feet.
In chapel, monks chanted, their voices echoing through the stone walls.
After prayers came the day’s simple routines. His quill scratched across his sheet in slow meticulous strokes as he wrote the sacred words of God.
But as he stepped outside after prayers, he noticed a change in the horizon – something dark interrupting the amber glow of the sinking sun. The silhouettes grew clearer: long, narrow hulls cutting across the water.
Ships.
At that moment, the sky darkened as heavy clouds rolled in, swallowing the last traces of sunlight. Lightning tore across the sky in jagged flashes, illuminating the tempest before everything was plunged into shadows. The Viking longboats knifed through the stormy seas, carved with dragon heads and powered by oars and square sails.
Monks gathered, surveying the newcomers from the rocky hillside as they descended their longboats amidst the crashing waves, and waded vigorously towards the holy island. Their armour shimmered like a ghostly curtain as the silhouettes stumbled out onto the fine marshes of Lindisfarne. They proceeded up the hill, their faces living masks of hunger for glory and defiance of death. Their boots clanked on the grainy earth as they charged towards the throng of monks, shouting war cries in foreign tongue.
“Who are these people?” breathed Soren to Brother Aeldric through the howling wind as they gazed down from above. Brother Aeldric shrugged, his eyes fixated on the drama below. Them and the other monks were still watching the horror unfold when Soren suddenly remembered something – something important.
“Brother Aeldric,” he whispered, then louder, “the book.”
Together they ran downhill, their robes rippling, stones scattering beneath their feet.
“Faster,” Soren cried.
Smoke was already rising below, and the church bells were ringing in the distance like a drum of impending doom. They reached the stone building just in time to hear the shouts of men coming closer.
“We will stay here and try to hold them off whilst you two try and get the book,” said Brother Henriyth who had come with them to the chapel.
“Are you sure? All of you?” inquired Soren.
“Yes,” they all shouted in unison. Soren sighed, but with guilt.
“Good luck,” Brother Henriyth exclaimed, patting them on the back, “keep our legacy alive.”
And they hurried away with what they had, ready to face their fate and to save the legacy of Lindisfarne.
They burst into the chapel. Candles burned softly and quietly under their arches, illumination the room and casting flickering shadows on the walls. In the centre, and alter stood underneath a wooden roof, protecting the sacred book: The Lindisfarne Gospels. Battle rumbled on outside, the enemy closing in on the precious book.
Then, Soren instinctively grabbed it and ran with Brother Aeldric. They ran and ran until their lungs were burning and sat down to rest.
They watched on as farmers raised farm tools against Sverds. Guards, animals, and priests fell to the ground, and Vikings poured onto the island bearing weapons and Skjöldrs by their sides. More longships cut through the water, each time unloading a new fresh terror. It was a symbolic assault on Lindisfarne: Viking raiders plundered its wealth, killed or enslaved monks, and desecrated the sacred relics of St Cuthbert.
Daylight filtered through the ruins of buildings that once stood proud as Soren stumbled out of a pile of rocks, bleary-eyed and half-stupefied. He walked in shuffling slow steps, pacing the crumbled walls of the Gertrude Jekyll Garden in repeated patterns, dazed yet had the grip of a Viking around the Lindisfarne Gospels.
The air was full with the blood of the slaughtered, and the whispers of the survived as they gathered in shock and grief, some whispering the devastation was a call for repentance, and some whispering about the loss of friends.
Soren gazed around at what remained of what was once his home – just an island despoiled of its ornaments and spattered with the blood of the priests of God. He sat down on layers of porous limestone, reflecting what he should do next.
Within the crowd of monks, their eyes widened with realization, and a silent thought, a flicker of hope and determination that had just been set alight.
