mattered, nor the fleeting good opinion of his men. Only the end. Stretched out, relaxed, perfectly aware of himself from crown to toe, Shef reflected on how the day might go.
Hund, he decided. Time for another call on Hund.
As the sun sucked up the morning mist, Ivar looked from his place with the ridge-line pickets to the familiar chaos of an English army advancing. Familiar chaos. An English army.
“It's not them,” said Dolgfinn beside him. “Not the Way-folk. Not Skjef Sigvarthsson. Look at all the Christ- stuff, the crosses and the black robes. You can hear them singing their morning
“Or else there's another army hiding round here somewhere, to finish off the winners,” Ivar completed for him. The grin was back on his face, pinched and painful, like a fox nibbling meat from the wolf-trap.
“Back to the boats?”
“I think not,” said Ivar. “The river's too narrow to turn forty boats in a hurry. And if we row on there's no certainty they won't mount and catch us. And if they do that they can take us out one boat at a time. Even the English might manage that.
“No. At our Bragi boast in the Braethraborg, my brothers and I swore to invade England and conquer all its kingdoms in revenge for our father. Two we have conquered, and today is the day for the third.”
“And Sigvarthsson?” prompted Dolgfinn.
The grin spread wider, teeth showing like a rictus. “He will have his chance. We will have to see he doesn't take it. Now, get down to the boats, Dolgfinn, and tell them to unload the machines. But not this bank. The far bank, understand? A hundred paces back. And rig a sail over each one as if it was a tent. Have men ready to look as if they're taking them down when the English come in sight. But take them down English-style—you know, as if you were ten old gammers comparing grandchildren. Have the slaves do it.”
Dolgfinn laughed. “You have trained the slaves to work better than that these months, Ivar.”
The mirth had drained completely from Ivar's face, the eyes gone as colorless as his skin. “Then untrain them,” he said. “The machines on that bank. The men on this.” He turned back to his survey of the army coming forward, six-deep, banners waving, great crosses on standard-carts behind its center. “And send up Hamal. He will lead the mounted patrol today. I have special orders for him.”
From his vantage point beneath a great flowering hawthorn, Shef looked out at the developing battle. The Army of the Way lay in its ranks behind and to either side of him, well spread-out and under cover of wood or hedgerow. The bulky pull-throwers were still not assembled, the twist-shooters with their horse-teams well to the rear. English bagpipers and Viking horn-blowers had all alike been threatened with disgrace, torment and forfeiture of a week's ale ration if they sounded a note. Shef was sure they had remained undiscovered. And now, as the battle seemed likely to be joined, both sides' wandering scouts would have been called into the center. So far so good.
And yet already there was a surprise. Ivar's machines. Shef had watched them being swayed from the boats, had noted the way the yards dipped and the boats heeled: heavy objects, whatever they were, far heavier than his own. Was that how Ivar had taken Lynn? And they had been put on the wrong bank. Safer from attack, maybe, but unable to move forward if the battle shifted the other way. Nor could even Shef's keen sight see how the machines were constructed. How would they affect his plan to fight the battle?
Even more, his plan not to fight the battle.
Cwichelm the marshal, veteran of many battles, would have halted the army if he could, as soon as his advance-guard reported the dragon-boats on the river in front of him. A Viking fleet was not what he had expected to fight. Anything unexpected should be scouted first—especially when dealing with the folk of the Way, whose many traps he remembered from the fight in the marsh when Sigvarth had died. He was not left to make the decision. Vikings and Way-men were all the same to his king: enemies of decency. To Wulfgar and the bishops, all were heathens. Dragon-boats spread out in line? So much the better! Destroy them before they could mass together. “And if they are not Way-folk,” the young Alfgar had added with pointed insolence, “so much less to worry about. At least they will not have the machines you fear so much.”
Stung by the insult, aware that complex maneuvering would not work with the untrained thanes who made up most of King Burgred's army, Cwichelm took his men over the slight ridge above the river at a brisk trot, he and his assistants well out in front, shouting their war-cries and waving their broadswords for the rest to come on.
The English army, seeing the hated dragon-boats in front of them, each crew clumped in a wedge before its boat, cheered and came on with enthusiasm. Just so long as they don't get disheartened, thought Cwichelm, dropping back till the ranks closed round him. Or get tired before the battle's even started. He settled his shield firmly on his shoulder, making no effort to lift it to guard-position. It weighed a stone—fourteen English pounds—the rest of his weapons and armor, three stone more. Not too much to carry. A lot to run with. Even more to wield. Through the sweat that ran into his eyes he noted dimly the men on the far bank struggling with canvas. Not often you catch Vikings napping, he thought. It's usually us that's up last.
The first volley from Erkenbert's onagers smashed six holes in the English battle-line, each stone driving clear through the six-deep ranks. The one aimed for the commanders in the center—conspicuous in gold and garnets and scarlet tunics—lifted a trifle high, at head height. Cwichelm never felt or saw the blow that drove his head straight back till the neckbone snapped, that reaped a file of men behind him and crashed on to bury itself in the earth just short of the cart from which Bishop Daniel was chanting an encouraging psalm. In an instant both he and the army were headless.
Most of the English warriors behind their visored helmets did not even see what had happened to their right or their left. They could see only the enemy in front of them, the enemy so tantalizingly gathered in isolated clumps and wedges, each one forty-strong in front of its ship, five or ten yards between them. In a yelling wave they ran forward to beat on the Viking wedges with spear and broadsword, hacking at the linden-shields, sweeping at head and leg. Braced and rested, Ivar Ragnarsson's outnumbered men strained every muscle to hold them for the five minutes their chief had demanded.
Through the carefully measured firing-lanes the catapults launched their irresistible missiles again and again.
“Something's happening already,” grunted Brand.
Shef made no reply. For several minutes he had strained his one eye desperately to see what he could of the machines that were wreaking such havoc in Burgred's army. Then he fixed on one, counted his heartbeats carefully between one launch and the next. By now he had a good idea of what the weapons were. They must be torsion- machines—the slow rate of shot showed that, as did the smashing effect, the swirls of men bowled over as each missile struck. They were not on a bow principle. Little as he could see from a mile's distance, the square, high shape showed that. And the weight of them, the weight he could detect from the way they had to be slung on yards and pulleys—that showed they must be built stoutly to take some sort of impact. Yes. A little experiment, a closer look if he got the chance, and…
Time now to think more immediately. Shef turned his attention to the battle. Something happening, Brand said. And easy enough to guess what. After a few volleys, the men on the English side, nearest to where the stones were arriving, had started to edge sideways, realizing that safety lay in having wedges of their enemies between them and the machines. But as they edged sideways they hampered the efforts and the sword-arms of the champions trying to break through Ivar's crewmen. Many of those champions, half-blinded by their helmets, weighed down by their armor, had no idea what was going on, only that something strange was happening round them. Some of them were beginning to step back, to look for space to raise their visors, to shove off the men who should be backing them but were jostling them instead. If Ivar's men were concentrated they could use such a moment to break out. But they were not. They themselves were in small groups, each one liable to be swallowed instantly by superior numbers if they drove forward from their ships and the protecting riverbank. The battle hung in balance.
Brand grunted again, this time digging his fingers deep into Shef's arm. Someone by Ivar's machines had given an order to change targets, was enforcing it with kicks and blows. As the English swordsmen rushed forward, the clumsy standard-carts behind them were left exposed, each one with a waving banner on it—of king or
