The large woman had been winded and taken by surprise, but she was recovering. She was also much bigger than Benedetta. She heaved up, trying to throw the smaller woman off, but Benedetta managed to stay straddling her, still screaming and hammering her fists at the red face that was now spattered with blood from the woman’s nose. The woman threw a punch at Benedetta that she fortuitously blocked with a forearm, but the strength of the blow silenced Benedetta who suddenly realised her danger. Again I started forward and again Egil stopped me. ‘She’ll win,’ he said, though I could not see how.
But Benedetta was quicker than I was. She reached out, found a stone from the crumbling edge of the Roman road, and smashed it into the side of the woman’s head.
‘Ouch,’ Finan said, grinning. My men, both Norse and Saxon, were laughing and cheering, and that cheering grew louder as the big woman sank back, evidently dazed, her mouth open as blood showed in her scrawny hair.
Benedetta snarled in Italian. I had learned a little of her language and thought I recognised the words for wash and mouth, then she stretched out her right arm and scooped a wet, messy handful of cow shit.
‘Oh no,’ Finan said, grinning.
‘Oh yes!’ Egil said happily.
‘Ti pulisco la bocca!’ Benedetta shrieked and slapped the handful of shit into the woman’s open mouth. The woman spluttered, and Benedetta, not wanting to be spattered with the dung, stood. She bent and cleaned her hands on the woman’s skirts, then turned to me. ‘Her curses do not work,’ she said. ‘She speak shit? She eat shit. I have pushed the evil she spoke back into her mouth. It is done!’ She turned, spat on the woman, and retrieved her horse. My men were still cheering her. Whatever damage the raw-boned woman might have caused to Egil’s men had been undone by Benedetta. Warriors love a fight, admire a winner, and Benedetta had turned an evil omen into a good one. She rode her horse to me. ‘See?’ she said. ‘You needed me. Who else can avert evil?’
‘You shouldn’t be here,’ I said.
‘I was a slave!’ she said truculently. ‘And all my life men tell me what to do. Now no man commands me, not even you! But I protect you!’
‘I told my men they couldn’t bring their women,’ I said.
‘Ha! There are many women with the servants! You men know nothing.’
Which was probably true and, if I was honest, I was comforted by her presence. ‘But if there’s a battle,’ I insisted, ‘you stay away!’
‘And if I had stayed in Bebbanburg? Who would have protected you from that woman’s curses? Tell me that!’
‘You’ll not win!’ Egil called cheerfully.
I reached out and touched her cheek. ‘Thank you.’
‘Now we go,’ she announced proudly.
We went.
If Benedetta’s victory over the Danish woman was the first omen, the second was more ominous. We had ridden inland to the first ford where we could cross the Mærse and it was growing dark as, with the river behind us, we turned our horses westwards again and travelled the familiar road to Ceaster. The eastern sky was already black, while the west was a turmoil of dark cloud streaked with the dying fire of the disappearing sun. A chill wind blew from that sky of dark fire, lifting cloaks and horses’ manes. ‘There’ll be rain,’ Egil said.
‘Pray God we reach Ceaster first,’ Finan grunted.
And just then that red-black western sky was split by white lightning, not a small strike, but a jagged, horizon wide splintering of massive brilliance that momentarily threw the whole landscape into vivid black and white. A moment later the sound arrived, a bellow of Asgard’s anger that rumbled overhead, crushing us with its noise.
Snawgebland bridled, jerked his head up, and I had to soothe him. I let him stand a moment, feeling him tremble, then nudged him forward.
‘It’s coming,’ Egil said.
‘What? The storm?’
‘The battle.’ He touched his hammer.
The lightning had struck over Wirhealum. What did that omen mean? That the danger came from the west? From Ireland where Anlaf had conquered his enemies and lusted after Northumbria? I spurred Snawgebland, wanting to reach Ceaster’s walls before the storm blew in from the sea. Another bolt of lightning slithered to earth, this one smaller, but much nearer, slashing down to the low hills and rich pastures of Wirhealum, the land between the rivers. Then the rain came. At first there were just a few scattered heavy drops, but then it began to fall in torrents, the noise so loud that I had to shout my warning to Egil. ‘This is a graveyard! A Roman one! Stay on the road!’
My men were touching crosses or hammers, praying that the gods would not stir the dead from their long cold graves. Another sky-splintering shaft of lightning lit the walls of Ceaster ahead of us.
It took long wet minutes to persuade the guards on the high Roman ramparts that we were friendly, indeed it was not till my son, the bishop, was summoned to the fighting platform above the massive arch that the garrison reluctantly unbarred the huge gates. ‘Who commands here?’ I shouted at one of the guards as we spurred through the gate tunnel that was lit by two sputtering torches.
‘Leof Edricson, lord!’
I had never heard of him. I was hoping the city would be commanded by a man I knew, alongside whom I had fought, and a man who would help us find shelter. That, I realised, would be hard because the city was crowded with refugees and their livestock. We pushed through cattle and I slid from Snawgebland’s saddle in the familiar square that lay in front of Ceaster’s great hall.
