Sword Song

We left, riding through the city streets, out through the western gate that was known as Ludd’s Gate, and then down to the ford across the River Fleot. Sihtric was bent over his saddle’s pommel, still suffering from the kicking he had received from Sigefrid. I looked behind as we left the ford, half expecting that Sigefrid would have countermanded his brother’s decision and sent men to pursue us, but none appeared. We spurred through the marshy ground and then up the slight slope to the Saxon town.

I did not stay on the road that led westward, but instead turned onto the wharves where a dozen ships were moored. These were river boats that traded with Wessex and Mercia. Few shipmasters cared to shoot the dangerous gap in the ruined bridge that the Romans had thrown across the Temes, so these ships were smaller, manned by oarsmen, and all of them had paid dues to me at Coccham. They all knew me, because they did business with me on every trip.

We forced our way through heaps of merchandise, past open fires and through the gangs of slaves loading or unloading cargoes. Only one ship was ready to make a voyage. She was named the Swan and I knew her well. She had a Saxon crew, and she was nearly ready to leave because her oarsmen were standing on the wharf while the shipmaster, a man called Osric, finished his business with the merchant whose goods he was carrying. “You’re taking us too,” I told him.

We left most of the horses behind, though I insisted that room was found for Smoca, and Finan wanted to keep his stallion too, and so the beasts were coaxed into the Swan’s open hold where they stood shivering. Then we left. The tide was flooding, the oars bit, and we glided upriver. “Where am I taking you, lord?” Osric the shipmaster asked me.

“To Coccham,” I said.

And back to Alfred.

The river was wide, gray, and sullen. It flowed strongly, fed by the winter rains against which the incoming tide gave less and less resistance. The Swan made hard work of the early rowing as the ten oarsmen fought the current and I caught Finan’s eye and we exchanged smiles. He was remembering, as I was, our long months at the oars of a slave-rowed trading ship. We had suffered, bled, and shivered, and we had thought that only death could release us from that fate, but now other men rowed us as the Swan fought around the great swooping bends of the Temes that were softened by the wide floods that stretched into the water meadows.

I sat on the small platform built in the ship’s blunt bow and Father Pyrlig joined me there. I had given him my cloak, which he clutched tight around him. He had found some bread and cheese, which did not surprise me because I have never known a man eat so much. “How did you know I’d beat Sigefrid?” he asked.

“I didn’t know,” I said. “In fact I was hoping he’d beat you, and that there would be one less Christian.”

He smiled at that, then gazed at the waterfowl on the flood water. “I knew I had two or three strokes only,” he said, “before he realized I knew what I was doing. Then he’d have cut the flesh off my bones.”

“He would,” I agreed, “but I reckoned you had those three strokes and they’d prove enough.”

“Thank you for that, Uhtred,” he said, then broke off a lump of cheese and gave it to me. “How are you these days?”

“Bored.”

“I hear you’re married?”

“I’m not bored with her,” I said hurriedly.

“Good for you! Me, now? I can’t stand my wife. Dear God, what a tongue that viper has. She can split a sheet of slate just by talking to it! You’ve not met my wife, have you?”

“No.”

“Sometimes I curse God for taking Adam’s rib and making Eve, but then I see some young girl and my heart leaps and I think God knew what he was doing after all.”

I smiled. “I thought Christian priests were supposed to set an example?”

“And what’s wrong with admiring God’s creations?” Pyrlig asked indignantly. “Especially a young one with plump round tits and a fine fat rump? It would be sinful of me to ignore such signs of his grace.” He grinned, then looked anxious. “I heard you were taken captive?”

“I was.”

“I prayed for you.”

“Thank you for that,” I said, and meant it. I did not worship the Christian god, but like Erik I feared he had some power, so prayers to him were not wasted.

“But I hear it was Alfred who had you released?” Pyrlig asked.

I paused. As ever I hated to acknowledge any debt to Alfred, but I grudgingly conceded that he had helped. “He sent the men who freed me,” I said, “yes.”

“And you reward him, Lord Uhtred, by naming yourself King of Mercia?”

“You heard that?” I asked cautiously.

“Of course I heard it! That great oaf of a Norseman bawled it just five paces from my ear. Are you King of Mercia?”

“No,” I said, resisting the urge to add “not yet.”

“I didn’t think you were,” Pyrlig said mildly. “I’d have heard about that, wouldn’t I? And I don’t think you will be, not unless Alfred wants it.”

“Alfred can piss down his own throat for all I care,” I said.

“And of course I should tell him what I heard,” Pyrlig said.

“Yes,” I said bitterly, “you should.”

I leaned against the curving timber of the ship’s stem and stared at the backs of the oarsmen. I was also watching for any sign of a pursuing ship, half expecting to see some fast warship swept along by banks of long oars, but no mast showed above the river’s long bends, which suggested Erik had successfully persuaded his brother against taking an instant revenge for the humiliation Pyrlig had given him. “So whose idea is it,” Pyrlig asked, “that you should be king in Mercia?” He waited for me to answer, but I said nothing. “It’s Sigefrid, isn’t it?” he demanded. “Sigefrid’s crazy idea.”

“Crazy?” I asked innocently.

“The man’s no fool,” Pyrlig said, “and his brother certainly isn’t. They know ?thelstan’s getting old in East Anglia, and they ask who’ll be king after him? And there’s no king in Mercia. But he can’t just take Mercia, can he? The Mercian Saxons will fight him and Alfred will come to their aid, and the Thurgilson brothers will find themselves facing a fury of Saxons! So Sigefrid has this idea to rally men and take East Anglia first, then Mercia, and then Wessex! And to do all that he really needs Earl Ragnar to bring men from Northumbria.”

I was appalled that Pyrlig, a friend of Alfred’s, should know all that Sigefrid, Erik, and Haesten planned, but I showed no reaction. “Ragnar won’t fight,” I said, trying to end the conversation.

“Unless you ask him,” Pyrlig said sharply. I just shrugged. “But what can Sigefrid offer you?” Pyrlig asked, and, when I did not respond again, provided the answer himself. “Mercia.”

I smiled condescendingly. “It all sounds very complicated.”

“Sigefrid and Haesten,” Pyrlig said, ignoring my flippant comment, “have ambitions to be kings. But there are only four kingdoms here! They can’t take Northumbria because Ragnar won’t let them. They can’t take Mercia because Alfred won’t let them. But ?thelstan’s getting old, so they could take East Anglia. And why not finish the job? Take Wessex? Sigefrid says he’ll put that drunken nephew of Alfred’s on the throne, and that’ll help calm the Saxons for a few months until Sigefrid murders him, and by then Haesten will be King of East Anglia and someone, you perhaps, King of Mercia. Doubtless they’ll turn on you then and divide Mercia between them. That’s the idea, Lord Uhtred, and it’s not a bad one! But who’d follow those two brigands?”

“No one,” I lied.

“Unless they were convinced that the Fates were on their side,” Pyrlig said almost casually, then looked at me. “Did you meet the dead man?” he asked innocently, and I was so astonished by the question that I could not answer. I just stared into his round, battered face. “Bjorn, he’s called,” the Welshman said, putting another lump of cheese into his mouth.

“The dead don’t lie,” I blurted out.

“The living do! By God, they do! Even I lie, Lord Uhtred.” He grinned at me mischievously. “I sent a message to my wife and said she’d hate being in East Anglia!” He laughed. Alfred had asked Pyrlig to go to East Anglia