My son had pierced his enemy through the belly. He had ripped the sword free, turned his horse, then swung the blade back onto the man’s neck. It was brutal, it was quick, and it was well done. The man swayed, his horse swerved, and he fell with a thump into the weeds beside the road. His body jerked as the blood stained the dust.
Guthfrith lurched again and I rammed the sword-blade harder, crushing his beard against his throat. ‘You’re a guest on my land,’ I told him, ‘so behave yourself.’
Berg had freed Hrothweard. The man holding the archbishop’s horse had released his grip on the reins, then tried to turn and flee. That was fatal, especially against a man as skilled and fierce as Berg, a Norseman himself. Now the man was writhing on the ground and his horse was trotting away alongside Guthfrith’s bloody-mouthed stallion. ‘To me, Berg!’ I bellowed. Guthfrith tried to speak and flapped a hand at me. ‘Move again,’ I told him, ‘and I’ll cut your fat throat.’ He stayed still.
Finan, as he had promised, was coming like the wind, the horses leaving a plume of dust from the dry ground. Our horses were far less tired than Guthfrith’s stallions and so Finan had reached me sooner. ‘Stop!’ I bellowed at Finan over the thunder of hooves. ‘Stop! All of you! Stop!’ I had to stand and hold my hands wide to make them understand, and Guthfrith tried to haul me down so I smacked his helmet with the flat of Boar’s Tusk. He tried to seize the blade and I jerked it back and saw blood start from his hand. ‘Idiot,’ I snarled and thumped him with the blade again. ‘Gerbruht!’ I shouted. ‘Gerbruht! Come here!’
My men had stopped in a cloud of dust. Gerbruht, a hugely strong Frisian, kicked his stallion towards me and slid from the saddle. ‘Lord?’
‘Hold him upright,’ I said. ‘He’s a king, but you can hammer the bastard senseless if he struggles.’
Guthfrith’s men had been much slower to understand what was happening, but they had finally responded by spurring forward and now saw Gerbruht holding their king upright with a sword-blade at his neck. They slowed and stopped.
Guthfrith did not struggle, just spat at me, which made Gerbruht increase the sword’s pressure. ‘Keep him alive,’ I said reluctantly.
I had captured a king, a king who had wasted his kingdom, robbed his people, and let their enemies ride hard and savage across his western lands. Now King Æthelstan was in Eoferwic, and King Æthelstan was a just king, a stern king, but he was only king because I had fought for him at Lundene’s Crepelgate. I had once thought of Æthelstan as a son. I had protected him from powerful enemies, taught him the skills of a warrior, and watched him grow. Yet he had betrayed me. He had sworn never to invade Northumbria while I lived, yet he was here, in Northumbria, with an army.
I am a Northumbrian. My country is the wind-flogged coast and the rain-darkened hills and the gaunt high rocks of the north. From the lush farmlands around Eoferwic to the high pastures where folk scratch a living from thin soil, from the harsh waters where men fish to the bleak moors and deep forests where we hunt the deer, it is a land my ancestors conquered. They settled it, built strong homesteads and fortresses, and then they defended it. We are Saxons and Danes, Norsemen and Angles, and we are Northumbrians.
Yet a little country in a big land has a small future. I knew that. To our north was Constantine’s Alba, which we called Scotland, and Constantine feared the Saxons to our south. The Saxons and the Scots were both Christians, and Christians tell us that their god is love, and we must love one another and turn the other cheek, but when land is at stake those beliefs fly away and swords are drawn. Constantine ruled Alba, and Æthelstan ruled Wessex, Mercia and East Anglia, and both wanted Northumbria. ‘Northumbria speaks our tongue,’ Æthelstan had told me once, ‘the tongue of our folk, and they must be part of one country, the country that speaks Ænglisc!’
That was the dream of King Alfred. Back when the Danes seemed to have conquered all of Britain, and when Alfred was a fugitive in the marshes of Sumorsæte, that dream had been as feeble as a dying rushlight. Yet we had fought, we had won, and now King Alfred’s grandson ruled all the land of Englaland except my land, Northumbria.
‘Fight for me,’ a voice said.
I turned and saw it was Guthfrith who had spoken. ‘You could have fought at Eoferwic,’ I said, ‘but you ran away.’
He hated me, yet I saw the shudder cross his face as he forced himself to speak calmly. ‘You’re a pagan, a Northumbrian. You want the Christians to win?’
‘No.’
‘Then fight for me! My men, your men, and Egil Skallagrimmrson will bring his men!’
‘And we’ll still be outnumbered six to one,’ I said curtly.
‘And if we’re behind the walls of Bebbanburg?’ Guthfrith pleaded. ‘What will that matter? Constantine will help us!’
‘Then he’ll take your kingdom,’ I said.
‘He promised not to!’ he blurted desperately.
I paused. ‘Promised?’ I asked, but he said nothing. Guthfrith had doubtless spoken in despair and spoken more than he had meant to say, and now regretted it. So Constantine had sent envoys to Eoferwic? And Guthfrith had received them? I wanted to draw Wasp-Sting, my short-sword, and ram it into his belly, but Archbishop Hrothweard was at my side and Bishop Oda had dismounted and now stood beside him.
‘Lord King,’ Bishop Oda bowed to Guthfrith, ‘I am sent with brotherly greetings from King Æthelstan.’ Oda looked at Gerbruht. ‘Release him, man, release him!’
Guthfrith just stared at
