“Yes, lord,” I said, “because I missed you.”
“You did?” he asked in hope.
“Yes, lord,” I said, “I did.” And oddly enough, that was true. I had thought I would hate him when I saw him again, but I had forgotten his infectious charm. I liked him still. We embraced. Guthred picked up his helmet and went to the door that was a piece of cloth hooked onto nails. “I shall leave you my house tonight,” he said, smiling. “The two of you,” he added.
And he did.
Gisela. These days, when I am old, I sometimes see a girl who reminds me of Gisela and there comes a catch into my throat. I see a girl with a long stride, see the black hair, the slim waist, the grace of her movements and the defiant upward tilt of her head. And when I see such a girl I think I am seeing Gisela again, and often, because I have become a sentimental fool in my dotage, I find myself with tears in my eyes.
“I already have a wife,” I told her that night.
“You’re married?” Gisela asked me.
“Her name is Mildrith,” I said, “and I married her a long time ago because Alfred ordered it, and she hates me, and so she’s gone into a nunnery.”
“All your women do that,” Gisela said. “Mildrith, Hild, and me.”
“That’s true,” I said, amused. I had not thought of it before.
“Hild told me to go into a nunnery if I was threatened,” Gisela told me.
“Hild did?”
“She said I’d be safe there. So when Kjartan said he wanted me to marry his son, I went to the nunnery.”
“Guthred would never have married you to Sven,” I said.
“My brother thought about it,” she said. “He needed money. He needed help and I was all he had to offer.”
“The peace cow.”
“That’s me,” she said.
“Did you like the nunnery?”
“I hated it all the time you were away. Are you going to kill Kjartan?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Or perhaps Ragnar will kill him. Ragnar has more cause than me.”
“When I refused to marry Sven,” Gisela said, “Kjartan said he’d capture me and let his men rape me. He said he’d stake me on the ground and let his men use me, and when they were done he’d let his dogs have me. Did you and Mildrith have children?”
“One,” I said, “a son. He died.”
“Mine won’t die. My sons will be warriors, and my daughter will be the mother of warriors.”
I smiled, then ran my hand down her long spine so that she shivered on top of me. We were covered by three cloaks and her hair was wet because the thatch was leaking. The floor-rushes were rotted and damp beneath me, but we were happy. “Did you become a Christian in your nunnery?” I asked her.
“Of course not,” she said scornfully.
“They didn’t mind?”
“I gave them silver.”
“Then they didn’t mind,” I said.
“I don’t think any Dane is a real Christian,” she told me.
“Not even your brother?”
“We have many gods,” she said, “and the Christian god is just another one. I’m sure that’s what Guthred thinks. What’s the Christian god’s name? A nun did tell me, but I’ve forgotten.”
“Jehovah.”
“There you are, then. Odin, Thor, and Jehovah. Does he have a wife?”
“No.”
“Poor Jehovah,” she said.
Poor Jehovah, I thought, and was still thinking it when, in a persistent rain that slashed on the stony remnants of the Roman road and turned the fields to mud, we crossed the Swale and rode north to take the fortress that could not be taken. We rode to capture Dunholm.
NINE
It seemed simple when I suggested it. We should ride to Dunholm, make a surprise attack, and thus provide Guthred with a safe refuge and Ragnar with revenge, but Hrothweard had been determined to thwart us and, before we rode, there had been another bitter argument. “What happens,” Hrothweard had demanded of Guthred, “to the blessed saint? If you ride away, who guards Cuthbert?”
Hrothweard had passion. It was fed by anger, I suppose. I have known other men like him, men who could work themselves into a welter of fury over the smallest insult to the one thing they hold most dear. For Hrothweard that one thing was the church, and anyone who was not a Christian was an enemy to his church. He had become Guthred’s chief counselor, and it was his passion that gained him that position. Guthred still saw Christianity as a superior kind of sorcery, and in Hrothweard he thought he had found a man capable of working the magic. Hrothweard certainly looked like a sorcerer. His hair was wild, his beard jutted, he had vivid eyes, and boasted the loudest voice of any man I have ever met. He was unmarried, devoted only to his beloved religion, and men reckoned he would become the archbishop in Eoferwic when Wulfhere died.
Guthred had no passion. He was reasonable, gentle mostly, wanting those about him to be happy, and Hrothweard bullied him. In Eoferwic, where most of the citizens were Christians, Hrothweard had the power to summon a mob into the streets, and Guthred, to keep the city from riots, had deferred to Hrothweard. And Hrothweard had also learned to threaten Guthred with Saint Cuthbert’s displeasure, and that was the weapon he used on the eve of our ride to Dunholm. Our only chance of capturing the fortress was surprise, and that meant moving fast, and in turn that required that Cuthbert’s corpse and Oswald’s head and the precious gospel book must be left in Cetreht along with all the priests, monks, and women. Father Hrothweard insisted that our first duty was to protect Saint Cuthbert. “If the saint falls into the hands of the pagans,” he shouted at Guthred, “then he will be desecrated!” He was right, of course. Saint Cuthbert would be stripped of his pectoral cross and his fine ring, then fed to the pigs, while the precious gospel book from Lindisfarena would have its jeweled cover ripped off and its pages used to light fires or wipe Danish arses. “Your first duty is to protect the saint,” Hrothweard bellowed at Guthred.
“Our first duty,” I retorted, “is to preserve the king.”
The priests, of course, supported Hrothweard, and once I intervened he turned his passion against me. I was a murderer, a pagan, a heretic, a sinner, a defiler, and all Guthred needed to do to preserve his throne was bring me to justice. Beocca alone among the churchmen tried to calm the wild-haired priest, but Beocca was shouted down. Priests and monks declared that Guthred would be cursed by God if he abandoned Cuthbert, and Guthred looked confused and it was Ragnar who ended the silliness. “Hide the saint,” he suggested. He had to say it three times before anyone heard him.
“Hide him?” Abbot Eadred asked.
“Where?” Hrothweard demanded scornfully.
“There is a graveyard here,” Ragnar said. “Bury him. Who would ever search for a corpse in a graveyard?” The clerics just stared at him. Abbot Eadred opened his mouth to protest, but the suggestion was so sensible that the words died on his lips. “Bury him,” Ragnar went on, “then go west into the hills and wait for us.”
Hrothweard tried to protest, but Guthred supported Ragnar. He named ten warriors who would stay to protect the priests, and in the morning, as we rode, those men were digging a temporary grave in the cemetery where the saint’s corpse and the other relics would be hidden. The men from Bebbanburg also stayed at Cetreht. That was on my insistence. Aidan wanted to ride with us, but I did not trust him. He could easily cause my death by riding ahead and betraying our approach to Kjartan and so we took all his horses, which forced Aidan and his men to stay with the churchmen. Osburh, Guthred’s pregnant queen, also remained. Abbot Eadred saw her as a hostage
