The smoke of the burned boats drifted to the clouds for three days, and on the second day Egwine took the captured ship down stream with forty men and they landed on Palfleot and killed all the surviving Danes, except for six who were taken prisoner, and five of those six were stripped of their armour and lashed to stakes in the river at low tide so that they drowned slowly on the flood. Egwine lost three men in that fight, but brought back mail, shields, helmets, weapons, arm rings and one prisoner who knew nothing except that Svein had ridden towards Exanceaster. That prisoner died on the third day, the day that Alfred had prayers said in thanks to God for our victory. For now we were safe. Svein could not attack us for he had lost his ships, Guthrum had no way of penetrating the swamp and Alfred was pleased with me.
'The king is pleased with you,' Beocca told me. Two weeks before, I thought, the king would have told me that himself. He would have sat with me by the water's edge and talked, but now a court had formed and the king was hedged with priests.
'He should be pleased,' I said. I had been practising weapon craft when Beocca soughs me out. We practised every day, using stakes instead of swords, and some men grumbled that they did not need to play at fighting, and those I opposed myself and, when they had been beaten down to the mud, I told them they needed to play more and complain less.
'He's pleased with you,' Beocca said, leading me down the path beside the river, 'but he thinks you are squeamish.'
'Mel Squeamish?'
'For not going to Palfleot and finishing the job.'
'The job was finished,' I said. 'Svein can't attack us without ships.'
'But not all the Danes drowned,.' Beocca said.
'Enough died,' I said. 'Do you know what they endured? The terror of trying to outrun the tide?' I thought of my own anguish in the swamp, the inexorable tide, the cold water spreading and the fear gripping the heart. 'They had no ships! Why kill stranded men?'
'Because they are pagans,' Beocca said, 'because they are loathed by God and by men, and because they are Danes.'
And only a few weeks ago,' I said, 'you believed they would become Christians and all our swords would be beaten into and points to plough fields.'
Beocca shrugged that off. 'So what will Svein do now?' he wanted to know.
'March around the swamp,' I said, 'and join Guthrum.'
'And Guthrum is in Cippanhamm.' We were fairly certain of that. New men were coming to the swamp and they all brought news. Much of it was rumour, but many had heard that Guthrum had strengthened Cippanhamm's walls and was wintering there. Large raiding parties still ravaged parts of Wessex, but they avoided the bigger towns in the south of the country where West Saxon garrisons had formed. There was one such garrison at Dornwaraceaster and another at Wintanceaster, and Beocca believed Alfred should go to one of those towns, but Alfred refused, reckoning that Guthrum would immediately besiege him. He would be trapped in a town, but the swamp was too big to be besieged and Guthrum could not hope to penetrate the marshes.
'You have an uncle in Mercia, don't you?' Beocca asked, changing the subject abruptly.
'?thelred. He's my mother's brother, and an Ealdorman.'
He heard the flat tone of my voice. 'You're not fond of him?'
'I hardly know him.' I had spent some weeks in his house, just long enough to quarrel with his son who was also called ?thelred.
'Is he a friend of the Danes?'
I shook my head. 'They suffer him to live and he suffers them.'
'The king has sent messengers to Mercia,' Beocca said.
I grimaced. 'If he wants them to rise against the Danes they won't. They'll get killed.'
'He'd rather they brought men south in the springtime,' Beocca said and I wondered how a few Mercian warriors were supposed to get past the Danes to join us, but said nothing. 'We look to the springtime for our salvation,' Beocca went on, 'but in the meantime the king would like someone to go to Cippanhamm.'
'A priest?' I asked sourly, 'to talk to Guthrum?'
'A soldier,' Beocca said, 'to gauge their numbers.'
'So send me,' I offered.
Beocca nodded, then limped along the riverbank where the willow fish traps had been exposed by the falling tide. 'It's so different from Northumbria,' he said wistfully.
I smiled at that. 'You miss Ebensburg?'
'I would like to end my days at Lindisfarena,' he said. 'I would like to say my dying prayer on that island.' He turned and gazed at the eastern hills. 'The king would go to Cippanhamm himself,' he said, almost as an afterthought.
I thought I had misheard, then realised I had not. 'That's madness,' I protested.
'It's kingship,' he said.
'Kingship?'
'The Witan chooses the king,' Beocca said sternly, 'and the king must have the trust of the people. If Alfred goes to Cippanhamm and walks among his enemies, then folk will know he deserves to be king.'
'And if he's captured,' I said, 'then folk will know he's a dead king.'
'So you must protect him,' he said.
