The ships came inshore of the Farnea Islands, a wide channel, but treacherous unless a helmsman knew the waters. They came in single file and it was clear the leading ship did have such a helmsman because they avoided the dangers and rowed until they could gaze up at our high ramparts. The oarsmen backed water, men on the steering platforms shaded their eyes to stare at us, but none returned our waves. Then the rowers backed water and turned seawards, the late afternoon sun flashing reflected light from the rising and falling oar-blades. ‘So they’re not coming here,’ Finan grunted, meaning that the ships were not coming into our harbour.
Instead they followed the lead ship into the southernmost group of the Farnea Islands and there spent the night. They were lucky, the winds stayed calm. They would have been safer in Lindisfarena’s shallow anchorage, but there they would have been vulnerable to my men. ‘So they’re not friendly?’ Benedetta asked me when, in the dawn, we saw the six masts showing above the islands.
‘They don’t seem to be,’ I said, and later I sent a fishing boat to the islands with Oswi, dressed in a fish-stinking smock, pretending to be one of the crew.
‘They’re not friendly, lord,’ he confirmed. ‘Told us to go away.’
It was midday by then and shortly after, one of my tenants rode from the south to tell of an army marching towards us. ‘Bloody thousands of them, lord,’ he said, and it was shortly afterwards that we saw the first smoke rising in the south. We had all seen such smoke pillars before, rising into a summer sky to tell of a steading being burned. I counted six. I sent two horsemen north to warn Egil.
And by nightfall another twenty-three ships had arrived. Most were similar to the first six, blunt bowed and heavy, and all well crewed. A dozen were cargo ships, and all of them, including the six that had sheltered in the islands, worked their way over the bar and so into the tangle of channels and shallows inside Lindisfarena. There were too many men there now for my garrison to challenge. We could only watch and, as night fell, see the glow of campfires in the southern sky.
Daybreak brought the army. Horsemen first, over three hundred of them, and after them came men on foot, trudging in the day’s warmth. There were packhorses and mules, women carrying burdens, more men, and more horses. I counted at least eleven hundred men and knew there were more strung out on the long road south. More horsemen went through the village to link up with the men on the fleet. The villagers had fled into the fortress, driving their livestock ahead of them, and soldiers moved into the houses, though, as far as we could see, they were doing little harm. I had three ships, including Spearhafoc, moored in the harbour along with eight fishing boats. I had put no guards on the ships so they could easily have been captured and burned, but no one tried to swim out to them. Nor did any man come to the Skull Gate to talk to us, and I was not inclined to seek out a spokesman, even when, strangely, axemen cut down a grove of trees at the village’s southern end, chopped the branches and piled them into a vast heap that they burned. The smoke boiled into the sky.
It was mid afternoon when Æthelstan arrived. Men lined the road long before he appeared, and I heard the sound of spear shafts and swords being beaten against shields as he came nearer. Men started to cheer, and I saw five standard-bearers come into view. They waved the flags from side to side so that they spread in the windless air. Two carried Æthelstan’s personal flag, the dragon with the lightning bolt, two carried the dragon banner of Wessex, while the fifth had a great white flag with a scarlet cross.
Behind them were ranks of horsemen, all in mail and helmets, all carrying spears. They rode five abreast, most on grey horses and all wearing red cloaks despite the day’s heat. I grimaced at the sight of the cloaks because they reminded me of Æthelhelm’s men, though these cloaks were a richer red. Twenty ranks of horsemen appeared, then came two more standard-bearers with dragon banners, and just behind them, alone and on a big grey stallion, came Æthelstan.
Even at this distance he dazzled. His mail seemed to be made of polished silver, his helmet was burnished white and surrounded by a gold circlet. He rode straight-backed, proud, one gloved hand acknowledging the cheers of the men who lined the road’s edges. His tall grey horse had a scarlet saddle cloth and a bridle glinting with gold. Æthelstan glanced at the great fire at the village’s southern end which still spewed a thick pillar of smoke.
Behind Æthelstan were three black-robed priests mounted on black horses, then five more standard-bearers who led another one hundred red-cloaked horsemen. ‘Monarchus Totius Brittaniae,’ Finan said drily.
‘You learned Latin?’
‘Three words too many. And how many men has he got?’
‘Enough,’ I said. I had long stopped trying to count them, but there were at least fifteen hundred, and still they came from the south, while offshore a dozen West Saxon war ships rowed as close to Bebbanburg’s shore as they dared. The message could not have been clearer. Bebbanburg had been surrounded by land and by sea, and we had just two hundred and eighty-three warriors inside the ramparts.
‘I will call the devil onto him,’ Benedetta said vengefully. She had joined us, holding Alaina by the hand.
‘You can do that?’ Finan asked.
‘I am from Italy,’ she said proudly, ‘of course I can do
