“Kjartan stays at Dunholm, lord,” the man said, “that’s what they said, and that Ivarr will come north once he’s garrisoned Eoferwic.”
“There are sixty of Kjartan’s men in the valley,” Ragnar shouted back to his warriors, and his hand instinctively went to the hilt of Heart-Breaker. That was his sword, given the same name as his father’s blade as a reminder of his duty to revenge Ragnar the Elder’s death. “There are sixty men to kill!” he added, then called for a servant to bring his shield. He looked back to the scouts. “Who did they think you were?”
“We claimed to serve Hakon, lord. We said we were looking for him.”
Ragnar gave the men silver coins. “You did well,” he said. “So how many men does Guthred have in the fort?”
“Rolf says he’s got at least a hundred, lord.”
“A hundred? And he hasn’t tried to drive off sixty men?”
“No, lord.”
“Some king,” Ragnar said scornfully.
“If he fights them,” I said, “then at the end of the day he’ll have fewer than fifty men.”
“So what’s he doing instead?” Ragnar wanted to know.
“Praying, probably.”
Guthred, as we later learned, had panicked. Thwarted in his efforts to reach Bebbanburg he had turned west toward Cumbraland, thinking that in that familiar country he would find friends, but the weather had slowed him, and there were enemy horsemen always in sight and he feared ambush in the steep hills ahead. So he had changed his mind and decided to return to Eoferwic, but had got no farther than the Roman fort that had once guarded the crossings of the Swale at Cetreht. He was desperate by then. Some of his spearmen had deserted, reckoning that only death waited for them if they stayed with the king, so Guthred had sent messengers to summon help from Northumbria’s Christian thegns, but we had already seen the corpses and knew no help would come. Now he was trapped. The sixty men would hold him in Cetreht until Ivarr came to kill him.
“If Guthred is praying,” Beocca said sternly, “then those prayers are being answered.”
“You mean the Christian god sent us?” I asked.
“Who else?” he responded indignantly as he brushed down his black robe. “When we meet Guthred,” he told me, “you will let me speak first.”
“You think this is a time for ceremony?”
“I’m an ambassador!” he protested, “you forget that.” His indignation suddenly burst like a rain-sodden stream overflowing its banks. “You have no conception of dignity! I am an ambassador! Last night, Uhtred, when you told that Irish savage to cut my throat, what were you thinking of?”
“I was thinking of keeping you quiet, father.”
“I shall tell Alfred of your insolence. You can be sure of that. I shall tell him!”
He went on complaining, but I was not listening for we had ridden across the skyline and there was Cetreht and the curving River Swale beneath us. The Roman fort was a short distance from the Swale’s southern bank and the old earth walls made a wide square which enclosed a village which had a church at its center. Beyond the fort was the stone bridge the Romans had made to carry their great road which led from Eoferwic to the wild north, and half of the old arch still stood.
As we rode closer I could see that the fort was full of horses and people. A standard flew from the church’s gable and I assumed that must be Guthred’s flag showing Saint Cuthbert. A few horsemen were north of the river, blocking Guthred’s escape across the ford, while Rolf’s sixty riders were in the fields south of the fort. They were like hounds stopping up a fox’s earth.
Ragnar had checked his horse. His men were readying for a fight. They were pushing their arms into shield loops, loosening swords in scabbards, and waiting for Ragnar’s orders. I gazed into the valley. The fort was a hopeless refuge. Its walls had long eroded into the ditch and there was no palisade, so that a man could stroll over the ramparts without even breaking stride. The sixty horsemen, if they had wished, could have ridden into the village, but they preferred to ride close to the old wall and shout insults. Guthred’s men watched from the fort’s edge. More men were clustered about the church. They had seen us on the hill and must have thought we were new enemies, for they were hurrying toward the remnants of the southern rampart. I stared at the village. Was Gisela there? I remembered the flick of her head and how her eyes had been shadowed by her black hair, and I unconsciously spurred my horse a few paces forward. I had spent over two years of hell at Sverri’s oar, but this was the moment I had dreamed of through all that time, and so I did not wait for Ragnar. I touched spurs to my horse again and rode alone into the valley of the Swale.
Beocca, of course, followed me, squawking that as Alfred’s ambassador he must lead the way into Guthred’s presence, but I ignored him and, halfway down the hill he tumbled from his horse. He gave a despairing cry and I left him limping in the grass as he tried to retrieve his mare.
The late autumn sun was bright on the land that was still wet from rain. I carried a shield with a polished boss, I was in mail and helmet, my arm rings shone, I glittered like a lord of war. I twisted in my saddle to see that Ragnar had started down the hill, but he was slanting eastward, plainly intent on cutting off the retreat of Kjartan’s men, whose best escape would lie in the eastern river meadows.
I reached the hill’s foot and spurred across the flat river plain to join the Roman road. I passed a Christian cemetery, the ground lumpy and scattered with small wooden crosses looking toward the one larger cross which would show the resurrected dead the direction of Jerusalem on the day the Christians believed their corpses would rise from the earth. The road led straight past the graves to the fort’s southern entrance, where a crowd of Guthred’s men watched me. Kjartan’s men spurred to intercept me, barring the road, but they showed no apprehension. Why should they? I appeared to be a Dane, I was one man and they were many, and my sword was still in its scabbard. “Which of you is Rolf?” I shouted as I drew near them.
“I am,” a black-bearded man urged his horse toward me. “Who are you?”
“Your death, Rolf,” I said, and I drew Serpent-Breath and touched my heels to the stallion’s flanks and he went into the full gallop and Rolf was still drawing his sword when I pounded past him and swung Serpent-Breath and the blade sliced through his neck so that his head and helmet flew back, bounced on the road and rolled under my horse’s hooves. I was laughing because the battle-joy had come. Three men were ahead of me and none had yet drawn a sword. They just stared at me, aghast, and at Rolf’s headless trunk that swayed in the saddle. I charged the center man, letting my horse barge into his and striking him hard with Serpent-Breath, and then I was through Kjartan’s horsemen and the fort was in front of me.
Fifty or sixty men were standing at the fort’s entrance. Only a handful were mounted, but nearly all had swords or spears. And I could see Guthred there, his fair curly hair bright in the sun, and next to him was Gisela. I had tried so often to summon her face in those long months at Sverri’s oar, and I had always failed, yet suddenly the wide mouth and the defiant eyes seemed so familiar. She was dressed in a white linen robe, belted at her waist with a silver chain, and she had a linen bonnet on her hair which, because she was married, was bound into a knot. She was holding her brother’s arm, and Guthred was just staring at the strange events unfolding outside his refuge.
Two of Kjartan’s men had followed me while the rest were milling around, torn between the shock of Rolf’s death and the sudden appearance of Ragnar’s war-band. I turned on the two men following me, wrenching the stallion about so sharply that his hooves scrabbled in the wet mud, but my sudden turn drove my pursuers back. I spurred after them. One was too fast, the second was on a lumbering horse and he heard my hoofbeats and swung his sword back in a desperate attempt to drive me off. I took the blade on my shield, then lunged Serpent-Breath into the man’s spine so that his back arched and he screamed. I tugged Serpent-Breath free and back-swung her into the man’s face. He fell from the saddle and I rode around him, sword red, and took off my helmet as I spurred again toward the fort.
I was showing off. Of course I was showing off. One man against sixty? But Gisela was watching. In truth I was in no real danger. The sixty men had not been ready for a fight, and if they pursued me now I could take refuge with Guthred’s men. But Kjartan’s men were not pursuing. They were too nervous of Ragnar’s approach and so I ignored them, riding close to Guthred and his men instead.
“Have you forgotten how to fight?” I shouted at them. I ignored Guthred. I even ignored Gisela, though I had taken off my helmet so she would recognize me. I knew she was watching me. I could sense those dark eyes and sense her astonishment and I hoped it was a joyful astonishment. “They’ve all got to die!” I shouted, pointing my
