continent. But there were green swathes of farmland within the walls. Nearly two centuries after King Alfred had ordered the reoccupation of Londinium, the English had still not filled up the old Roman space.
Today the city was even more crowded than usual, and the Norman ship had trouble finding a berth. Lunden was hosting the Christmas court of the King Edward, a ritual that was a descendant of the old witan meetings, and two archbishops, eight bishops, eight abbots, all five earls of England and all the nobles of the court, each with his or her retinues, had crowded here to turn the city into a nest of diplomacy, intrigue and gossip.
And, according to a letter sent to Orm by Godgifu of Northumbria, this year the Christmas court was an even more intense affair than usual – for, it was rumoured, Edward King of England was dying.
The ship berthed, and its crew and passengers disgorged into the narrow streets. The sailors left behind to watch the ships noisily ordered their companions to bring back only decent ale, maggot-free bread, and virginal whores.
Orm set off to find Westmynster, where Godgifu had promised to meet him. He had to ask directions several times, and the responses were in English or Danish, or a rough mix of the two. After centuries of immigration and invasion a new language was emerging from the rough argot of traders and soldiers, a rich mix of the vocabularies of the two tongues, all complexities in the grammar rubbed away.
Situated close to an enormous bend in the Tamesis, Westmynster turned out to be an island of gravel, cut out of the river bank by two tributary streams. Godgifu's letter said that the old name of this place was the Isle of Thorns. Here, supposedly, Caesar had forded the river during his first assault on Britain. Now the island had been drained, and Edward, in the course of his long reign, had established a royal palace, and an abbey.
And in recent years he had set about commemorating his pious reign by building a mighty new church here in the continental style. Still incomplete, its lead roof shining, it was a vast box of stone that made the English buildings nearby look rude and half-finished.
The streets around the abbey precinct were even more crowded than elsewhere. Somewhere in there, Orm supposed, great men were circling over a king's deathbed like buzzards. But Orm was a mere soldier of fortune, and his destination was not a palace – at least, not for now.
He skirted the abbey's walls until he spotted a tavern, a broken-down wooden building whose blackened thatch indicated it might once have been a smithy. It was unremarkable, save for the standard that fluttered in the smoggy breeze. The woollen tapestry, done in red and yellow, was a crude imitation of the Fighting Man standard of Harold son of Godwine.
And it was under this flag, just as she had promised, that Godgifu waited for him.
VI
'You look well.'
'So do you,' she said mockingly.
In Normandy and Brittany eighteen months before, as she rode with the warrior princes of Normandy and England, Godgifu had worn mannish clothes. Now pins studded her hair, and she wore a long dress tied tight at the waist, with heavy, expensive-looking brooches and clasps. She was dressed for court, not for the field. She was not beautiful. She was too short, her face was too square, her nose too long, her blue-eyed gaze too direct for that. But Orm was stunned by her mixture of femininity and strength. This was a woman to have at your side, he thought, when you won your land, and carved out your life. And, he saw, his own interest was returned in the lively warmth of her gaze.
'I haven't seen you since Normandy,' he began. 'Bayeux, that business of Harold and the oath.'
'Well, I know that.'
In the tension and confusion after that murky oath-taking, Orm, expected to stand beside his Norman lord, had lost track of Godgifu and her brother. And he had not seen her from that day to this.
'I was glad you wrote to me. I thought we might never see each other again. And we have unfinished business.'
She grinned, almost lascivious. 'So we have, Viking.'
'And we have business too,' said Sihtric. The priest came bustling from the tavern bearing a brimming tankard. 'Although I'm not interested in the contents of your trousers, Orm, but of your head.'
'For a man of God you're crude sometimes, priest.'
'Not crude but truthful, and God has no problem with that.' And he downed half his ale with a gulp. Sihtric was clean-shaven, his tonsure and eyebrows neatly plucked, and he wore a white tunic which glittered with golden thread. He was putting on weight too; he had a pot belly comically protruding from the front of his slight frame. He was evidently doing well. And yet the slyness and ambition Orm had discerned in the young priest he had met in Brittany was, if anything, even more striking.
'So what do you think of our new cathedral of Westmynster, Orm?'
'It is an impressive building.'
'Yes. The first cruciform church in all England, you know, and bigger than anything they have in Normandy -'
'I hate it,' Godgifu said with surprising strength. 'It's a Norman box. A coffin for God. It has no place in England.'
Sihtric grinned at Orm. 'You'll have to forgive my sister. Lacks sophistication sometimes. The cathedral is a sign of how the church has prospered under Edward. As, indeed, have I.'
Orm said, 'In her letter Godgifu told me you're closer to Harold now.'
Godgifu nodded. 'He has been ever since that business of William and the oath.'
So Sihtric had seen his chance and taken it, Orm thought. He said, goading, 'I'm surprised. I thought you were Earl Tostig's man. Aren't you loyal? Didn't you follow your master into exile?'
Both Godgifu and Sihtric glanced around nervously. Apparently the tensions surrounding the fall of Harold's brother were strong.
'Come,' Sihtric said. 'Not here, you never know who's listening. Let's drink and talk.' He led them both into the tavern, and fetched more ale.
'I am destined to meet you two in taverns, it seems,' said Orm.
'My brother likes his ale,' said Godgifu.
'My only vice,' said Sihtric, 'unlike poor Tostig.'
Harold's brother had been appointed Earl of Northumbria a decade before. It was a difficult realm, full of English who pined for the great days of their own kingdom, and of Danes who dreamed of the restoration of the Viking kings of Jorvik. For seven or eight years, though, Tostig looked secure. Then he murdered a few rivals, and, worse, tried to raise the Northumbrians' taxes.
Sihtric was slightly drunk. 'The thegns and ealdormen wouldn't have it, oh no, Tostig could murder their sons if he liked, but for him to come between them and their purses…'
The crisis had come in October, just three months ago. Tostig had been in the south, hunting with Edward, when the thegns had occupied Jorvik, slaughtered Tostig's officers and his housecarls, and sacked his treasury. And then they had called for a new earl: Morcar, brother of Edwin the Earl of Mercia, son of Siward the old rival of Godwine, a scion of the only great English family strong enough to challenge the sons of Godwine.
It had been a genuine crisis. King Edward had backed Tostig, who was his appointed earl. But Harold had ridden north, unarmed. And he recommended to the King that the demands of the rebels be met. Edward reluctantly backed down, Morcar was installed, and the crisis was passed.
But the cost for Harold was an irreparable breach with his brother. Tostig sailed off to exile in Flanders; rumour had it that he was plotting.
'Harold, you see,' said Sihtric, 'sacrificed his brother for a greater good – he did it once before, with another troublesome sibling called Swein who seduced a nun – although he let Tostig live, and I believe that was a mistake. Harold is a great man who will put the interests of peace even before his family – a remarkable man.'
'And,' Orm said, 'you who were Tostig's man are now welcome in Harold's court.'
'In Normandy I heard Harold's confession,' Sihtric said piously, 'for taking an oath he doubted he would ever be able to keep.'
