He looked so solemn, but also frightened, as if he were making a huge effort to hold onto the shreds of his dignity. Alfred never lacked for bravery, but he was not a warrior and he did not much like the company of warriors. In his eyes I was a brute; dangerous, uninteresting, but suddenly indispensable.
He knew I was not going to call him lord, so he did not insist.
'What do you notice about this place?' he asked.
'It's wet,' I said.
'What else?'
I looked for the trap in the question and found none. 'It can only be reached by punts,' I said, 'and the Danes don't have punts. But when they do have punts it'll need more than Leofric and me to fight them off.'
'It doesn't have a church,' he said.
'I knew I liked it,' I retorted.
He ignored that. 'We know so little of our own kingdom,' he said in wonderment. 'I thought there were churches everywhere.'
He closed his eyes for a few heartbeats, then looked at me plaintively. 'What should I do?'
I had told him to fight, but I could see no fight in him now, just despair.
'You can go south,' I said, thinking that was what he wanted to hear, 'go south across the sea.'
'To be another exiled Saxon king,' he said bitterly.
'We hide here,' I said, 'and when we think the Danes aren't watching, we go to the south coast and find a ship.'
'How do we hide?' he asked. 'They know we're here. And they're on both sides of the swamp.'
The marsh man had told us that a Danish fleet had landed at Cynuit, which lay at the swamp's western edge. That fleet, I assumed, was led by Svein and he would surely be wondering how to find Alfred. The king, I reckoned, was doomed, and his family too. If ?thelflaed was lucky she would be raised by a Danish family, as I had been, but more probably they would all be killed so that no Saxon could ever again claim the crown of Wessex.
'And the Danes will be watching the south coast,' Alfred went on.
'They will,' I agreed.
He looked out at the marsh where the night wind rippled the waters, shaking the long reflection of a winter moon. 'The Danes can't have taken all Wessex,' he said, then flinched because Edward was coughing so painfully.
'Probably not,’ I agreed.
'If we could find men,' he said, then fell silent.
'What would we do with men?' I asked.
'Attack the fleet,' he said, pointing west. 'Get rid of Svein, if it is Svein at Cynuit, then hold the hills of Defnascir. Gain one victory and more men will come. We get stronger and one day we can face Guthrum.'
I thought about it. He had spoken dully, as if he did not really believe in the words he had said, but I thought they made a perverse kind of sense. There were men in Wessex, men who were leaderless, but they were men who wanted a leader, men who would fight, and perhaps we could secure the swamp, then defeat Svein, then capture Defnascir, and so, piece by piece, take back Wessex. Then I thought about it more closely and reckoned it was a dream. The Danes had won. We were fugitives.
Alfred was stroking his daughter's golden hair. 'The Danes will hunt us here, won't they?'
'Yes.'
'Can you defend us?'
'Just me and Leofric?'
'You're a warrior, aren't you? Men tell me it was really you who defeated Ubba.'
‘You knew I killed Ubba?' I asked.
'Can you defend us?'
I would not be deflected. 'Did you know I won your victory at Cynuit?' I demanded.
'Yes,' he said simply.
'And my reward was to crawl to your altar? To be humiliated?' My anger made my voice too loud and ?thelflaed opened her eyes and stared at me.
'I have made mistakes,' Alfred said, 'and when this is all over, and when God returns Wessex to the West Saxons, I shall do the same. I shall put on the penitent's robe and submit myself to God.'
I wanted to kill the pious bastard then, but ?thelflaed was watching me with her big eyes. She had not moved, so her father did not know she was awake, but I did, so instead of giving my anger a loose rein I cut it off abruptly. 'You'll find that penitence helps,' I said.
He brightened at that. 'It helped you?' he asked.
'It gave me anger,' I said, 'and it taught me to hate. And anger is good. Hatred is good.'
'You don't mean that,' he said.
I half drew Serpent-Breath and little ?thelflaed's eyes grew wider.
'This kills,' I said, letting the sword slide back into its fleece-lined scabbard, 'but anger and hate are what
