Uhtred of Bebbanburg, the man who had killed Ubba beside the sea and who had destroyed Haesten’s army at Beamfleot, but on this cold Sunday morning it was the shepherd who was proving to be the better warlord. His panicked flock were tightly packed around the outlaws, who could hardly move. The dogs were howling, the sheep bleating and the thirteen men despairing.
I stepped out of the wood. ‘You wanted me?’ I called.
The young man’s response was to push towards me, but the tightly packed sheep obstructed him. He kicked at them, then hacked down with his sword, but the more he struggled the more scared the sheep became, and all the while the dogs herded them inwards. The young man cursed, then snatched at Willibald. ‘Let us go or we kill him,’ he said.
‘He’s a Christian,’ I said, showing him Thor’s hammer that hung about my neck, ‘so why should I care if you kill him?’
Willibald stared at me aghast, and then turned as one of the men shouted in pain. There had again been a sudden flash of holly-red blood in the sleet, and this time I saw what had caused it. It was neither the gods nor the murdered saint, but the shepherd who had come from the trees and was holding a sling. He took a stone from a pouch, placed it in the leather cup, and whirled the sling again. It made a whirring noise, he let go one cord and another stone hurtled in to strike a man.
They turned away in pure panic and I gestured at the shepherd to let them go. He whistled to call the dogs off and both men and sheep scattered. The men were running, all but the first archer who was still on the ground, stunned by the stone that had struck his head. The young man, braver than the others, came towards me, perhaps thinking his companions would help him, then realised he was alone. A look of pure fright crossed his face, he turned, and just then the bitch leaped at him, sinking her teeth in his sword arm. He shouted, then tried to shake her off as the dog hurtled in to join his mate. He was still shouting when I hit him across the back of the skull with the flat of my sword-blade. ‘You can call the dogs off now,’ I told the shepherd.
The first archer was still alive, but there was a patch of blood-matted hair above his right ear. I kicked him hard in the ribs and he groaned, but he was insensible. I gave his bow and arrow-bag to the shepherd. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Egbert, lord.’
‘You’re a rich man now, Egbert,’ I told him. I wished that were true. I would reward Egbert well for this morning’s work, but I was no longer rich. I had spent my money on the men, mail and weapons that had been needed to defeat Haesten and I was desperately poor that winter.
The other outlaws had vanished, gone back northwards. Willibald was shaking. ‘They were searching for you, lord,’ he said through chattering teeth, ‘they’ve been paid to kill you.’
I stooped by the archer. The shepherd’s stone had shattered his skull and I could see a ragged, splintered piece of bone among the blood-matted hair. One of the shepherd’s dogs came to sniff the wounded man and I patted its thick wiry pelt. ‘They’re good dogs,’ I told Egbert.
‘Wolf-killers, lord,’ he said, then hefted the sling, ‘though this is better.’
‘You’re good with it,’ I said. That was mild, the man was lethal.
‘Been practising these twenty-five years, lord. Nothing like a stone to drive a wolf away.’
‘They’d been paid to kill me?’ I asked Willibald.
‘That’s what they said. They were paid to kill you.’
‘Go into the hut,’ I said, ‘get warm.’ I turned on the younger man who was being guarded by the larger dog. ‘What’s your name?’
He hesitated, then spoke grudgingly, ‘W?rfurth, lord.’
‘And who paid you to kill me?’
‘I don’t know, lord.’
Nor did he, it seemed. W?rfurth and his men came from near Tofeceaster, a settlement not far to the north, and W?rfurth told me how a man had promised to pay my weight in silver in return for my death. The man had suggested a Sunday morning, knowing that much of my household would be in church, and W?rfurth had recruited a dozen vagrants to do the job. He must have known it was a huge gamble, for I was not without reputation, but the reward was immense. ‘Was the man a Dane or a Saxon?’ I asked.
‘A Saxon, lord.’
‘And you don’t know him?’
‘No, lord.’
I questioned him more, but all he could tell me was that the man was thin, bald and had lost an eye. The description meant little to me. A one-eyed, bald man? Could be almost anyone. I asked questions till I had wrung W?rfurth dry of unhelpful answers, then hanged both him and the archer.
And Willibald showed me the magic fish.
A delegation waited at my hall. Sixteen men had come from Alfred’s capital at Wintanceaster and among them were no less than five priests. Two, like Willibald, came from Wessex, and the other pair were Mercians who had apparently settled in East Anglia. I knew them both, though I had not recognised them at first. They were twins, Ceolnoth and Ceolberht who, some thirty years before, had been hostages with me in Mercia. We had been children captured by the Danes, a fate I had welcomed and the twins had hated. They were close to forty years old now, two identical priests with stocky builds, round faces and greying beards. ‘We have watched your progress,’ one of them said.
‘With admiration,’ the other finished. I had not been able to tell them apart when they were children, and still could not. They finished each other’s sentences.
‘Reluctant,’ one said.
‘Admiration,’ his twin said.
‘Reluctant?’ I asked in an unfriendly tone.
‘It is known that Alfred is disappointed,’
‘That you eschew the true faith, but…’
‘We pray for you daily!’
The remaining pair of priests, both West Saxons, were Alfred’s men. They had helped compile his code of laws and it appeared they had come to advise me. The remaining eleven men were warriors, five from East Anglia and six from Wessex, who had guarded the priests on their travels.
And they had brought the magic fish.
‘King Eohric,’ Ceolnoth or Ceolberht said.
‘Wishes an alliance with Wessex,’ the other twin finished.
‘And with Mercia!’
‘The Christian kingdoms, you understand.’
‘And King Alfred and King Edward,’ Willibald took up the tale, ‘have sent a gift for King Eohric.’
‘Alfred still lives?’ I asked.
‘Pray God, yes,’ Willibald said, ‘though he’s sick.’
‘Very close to death,’ one of the West Saxon priests intervened.
‘He was born close to death,’ I said, ‘and ever since I’ve known him he’s been dying. He’ll live ten years yet.’
‘Pray God he does,’ Willibald said and made the sign of the cross. ‘But he’s fifty years old, and he’s failing. He’s truly dying.’
‘Which is why he seeks this alliance,’ the West Saxon priest went on, ‘and why the Lord Edward makes this request of you.’
‘King Edward,’ Willibald corrected his fellow priest.
‘So who’s requesting me?’ I asked, ‘Alfred of Wessex or Edward of Cent?’
‘Edward,’ Willibald said.
‘Eohric,’ Ceolnoth and Ceolberht said together.
‘Alfred,’ the West Saxon priest said.
‘All of them,’ Willibald added. ‘It’s important to all of them, lord!’
Edward or Alfred or both wanted me to go to King Eohric of East Anglia. Eohric was a Dane, but he had converted to Christianity, and he had sent the twins to Alfred and proposed that a great alliance should be made
