coast for the Norman invasion. England's strength was being drained by this year of total war.
Godgifu looked to the south, wondering how far away the nearest Norman was.
Sihtric seemed plagued by doubt. 'Some say Harold has marched to meet the Normans too hastily. He has allowed the Bastard's violation of Godwine land to inflame his thinking.'
'No,' Godgifu said. 'Harold has a plan. At Haestingaceaster William has a defensible position, but Harold has ordered his navy to cut off any Norman retreat by sea, and stationed here to the north we contain him from moving further inland. We have bottled up the Bastard. All we need is a few days for the northern earls and the rest of the fyrd to join us, while the Normans starve and die.'
Sihtric muttered, 'Just a few days. But will the Normans give us even that much?'
'Well, in the meantime, I'm hungry. I'm going to find some food.' She walked off, looking for the first fires.
XX
Orm was wakened by a kick in the ribs. His hand went reflexively to his sword.
The kick had come from Guy fitz Gilbert. He carried a lantern so the men could see his face. All around Orm on the floor of this dingy mud-walled tavern, men under their cloaks were stirring, grumbling.
The window, just a hole in the wall, looked south, and the sky was still dark. Orm could hear the roll of the sea, and smelled salt and smoke. He remembered where he was. 'Haestingaceaster.'
'Yes,' fitz Gilbert said. 'You're still here in this arsehole of a place.'
Orm sat up gingerly. His head was sore, his belly aching. Last night he had joined the men in drinking this miserable tavern's stock of English beer dry. He could do with a bit more time to sleep it off, but that wasn't to be. He got to his feet and looked for his boots. 'I don't even know what day it is.'
'Saturday,' fitz Gilbert said, glaring. 'God's teeth, Egilsson, I'm glad it's not me paying your wages today.'
Orm scowled at him. 'Why am I even awake?'
'Because the Duke has had word, from Robert fitz Wimarc…' There were Normans in England before William's landing – merchants, mercenaries, immigrants. This fitz Wimarc had been a court official under Edward, and had no love for Harold. Now fitz Wimarc had informed William of the events of the last few weeks: Harold's victory at Stamfordbrycg, his rapid march to Lunden.
'They're trying to bottle us up,' Orm said. 'It's what I would do.'
'William is having none of it,' said fitz Gilbert.
'He isn't?'
Fitz Gilbert grinned, wolfish. Aged about thirty, he was small, stout, balding. In Normandy fitz Gilbert had struck Orm as pompous, ambitious, an irritant who was never likely to achieve much. But in England he seemed to be growing in stature, assuming an air of command. Normans were natural warriors, and on this stolen patch of foreign soil, fitz Gilbert was in his element. He said, 'We're going out to meet them before Harold has time to get his wind back from his march and dig in.'
'When?'
'Today. This morning. Now. God's teeth, Orm, find your wretched boots and come with me.'
Today was the day, then. The climax. Orm felt his heart thump.
Outside the tavern, under a pall of smoke from burning buildings, there was a stench of blood and shit. It came from the bodies of the tavern-keeper, and his wife and daughters. The women had been raped in the usual way, their lives ending with drunken impalings on swords and spears and axe-handles.
This had been a pretty place when they came here, like much of the country Orm had seen before, with sheep flocking in the well-kept fields, and bright new parish churches shining in the autumn sun. Now the sheep were driven off, the farms robbed and ruined, the people killed, even the churches burned out; this corner of England already smelled of blood and smoke, like Brittany and Maine and Anjou.
Riding with Normans, you got used to such things. Orm walked away, looking for the leaders.
Under the grey light of the pre-dawn English sky, William attended mass. Officiated by his half-brother Odo, a bishop in chain mail, it was held in the open so that as many of William's men as possible could see him and join in his prayers. William had a reliquary around his neck, a gold box containing the saint's finger on which Harold had sworn his broken oath in Bayeux.
At the end of the service William, stocky, bristling, stood before the restless ranks of warriors in their mail coats. 'Do you expect a speech? You won't get one from me. You all know what's what. We're stuck here, far from home. Death or victory, those are the only choices today. But if we win you will all soon be drowning in gold and women. Follow me, and it will be so. Let's get it done,' said the Bastard.
The men growled like bears.
William's nobles quickly formed the men into a column. Orm heard it was going to take two hours' marching to get to Harold's supposed muster point. Before the sun was up they were gathering on the road, the infantry in their mail coats, their shields on their arms and their swords in their sheaths on their backs, the archers and crossbowmen and slingshotters with their complicated gear. They stuck to their national groupings and their lords, the Normans with William, and the Flemish and Frankish, the Bretons and the men from Maine marching separately. The cavalry would ride beside the road. Scouts on fast horses set off, riding ahead to work out the lie of the land.
As the infantry began to march, shuffling slowly before they got their rhythm, they sang psalms in Latin. Their thousands of voices, joining together, rose up over the ruins of the burned-out town and the ruined farms beyond. If there were any English left alive they did not show themselves.
Orm was carrying many pounds of iron in his mail coat and his weapons. The massive men around him, laden as he was, jostled as they walked, iron clanking on iron, and dust rose up from their footsteps. But the pace was brisk, the air fresh, and as Orm walked he swung his arms, opening his chest, and felt his heart pump faster. He would soon burn off the ale at this rate. It was going to be a good day, he thought, and he joined the Normans in singing their songs of their God's mercy.
XXI
'There,' Sihtric pointed. 'I see them. On that ridge to the south.'
Godgifu peered that way. The sun was up now, and she had to shelter her eyes.
She was standing on marshy ground at the right hand end of a low ridge, where the English army was hastily assembling. The ridge, which was called Sandlacu, ran east to west, and bordered a swathe of uneven land that fell away to the south before her. Harold had advanced here from Caldbec Hill on being warned by his scouts of the Normans' advance.
And on another rise, further to the south, she saw a splash of colour: red, green gold, and what looked like stalks of wheat, waving in the slight breeze. Those stalks were spears.
'The Normans,' she said.
'Well, this is the battlefield,' Sihtric said. 'Where the weaving of time's tapestry will be completed. The Normans to the south, advancing from their ships and their base at Haestingaceaster. The English to the north, blocking their way to Lunden.'
'Shield wall against shield wall.'
'Ah, but it won't be so simple.' Sihtric pointed to bodies of horsemen, indistinct in the mist of morning, that rode back and forth before the Norman lines. 'See that? Cavalry.'
'So the Normans did not give us the days we needed to assemble our forces.'
Sihtric grunted. 'No. The Bastard has come to attack. I suppose if I were William I would have hesitated, and lost. But I am not William.'
'Then we must stand firm against him.'
