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‘His father was before him,’ Bledod said, as if that justified the title.
‘I thought Arthfael was King of Gwent?’
‘So he is, lord. Gruffudd is king beneath Arthfael.’
‘How many kings does Gwent have?’ I asked, amused.
‘It’s a mystery, lord, like the trinity.’
Cynlæf suddenly spurred his horse forward and slashed down with his sword. He had little room to move, but doubtless he hoped he could cut his way through the circle of men, though he must have known the hope was desperate, and so it was. The sword crashed into a shield and suddenly men were all around him, reaching for him. Cynlæf tried to draw the sword back, but one of Æthelstan’s warriors leaped up and seized his sword arm. Another snatched the horse’s bridle, while a third seized Cynlæf’s long hair and dragged him backwards. He fell, the horse reared and neighed, then the men backed away, and I saw Cynlæf being pulled to his feet. He was alive. For now.
‘Your King Gruffudd can leave with his son,’ I told Bledod, ‘but only after he tells us who bribed you. Not that he needs to tell us. I already know.’
‘You still think it was Cynlæf?’ he asked.
‘It was Æthelhelm the Younger,’ I said, ‘Ealdorman Æthelhelm.’
Who hated me and hated Æthelstan.
Æthelhelm the Elder was dead. He had died a prisoner in Bebbanburg. That had been inconvenient because his release had depended on his family paying me a ransom. The first part of that ransom, all in gold coins, had arrived, but Æthelhelm contracted a fever and died before the second payment was delivered.
His family had accused me of killing him, which was a nonsense. Why kill a man who would bring me gold? I would have been happy to kill him after the ransom was paid, but not before.
Æthelhelm had been the richest man in the kingdom of Wessex, richer even than King Edward to whom Æthelhelm had married his daughter. That marriage had made Æthelhelm as influential as he was wealthy, and it also meant that his grandson, Ælfweard, might become king after Edward. Ælfweard’s rival, of course, was Æthelstan, so it was no surprise that Æthelhelm had done all he could to destroy his grandson’s rival. And because I was Æthelstan’s protector I had also become Æthelhelm’s enemy. He had fought against me, he had lost, he had become my prisoner, and then he had died. We had sent his body home in a coffin, and I was told that by the time it reached Wiltunscir the corpse had swollen with gas, was leaking filthy liquid, and smelled vile.
I had liked Æthelhelm once. He had been genial and even generous, and we had been friends until his oldest daughter married a king and whelped a son. Now Æthelhelm’s eldest son, also called Æthelhelm, was also my enemy. He had succeeded his father as Ealdorman of Wiltunscir, and believed, wrongly, that I had murdered his father. I had taken gold from his family, and that was cause enough to hate me. I also protected Æthelstan. Even though King Edward had put aside his second wife and taken a younger woman, Æthelhelm the Younger still supported Edward because he hoped to see his nephew become the next king, but that support was given only so long as Ælfweard, Æthelhelm’s nephew, remained the crown prince. If Ælfweard became king, then Æthelhelm the Younger would remain the most powerful noble in Wessex, but if Æthelstan became king, then Æthelhelm and his family could look forward to royal revenge, to a loss of their estates, and even to enforced exile. And that prospect was more than enough reason to bribe a Welsh chieftain to take his famously savage warriors to Ceaster. If Æthelstan were to die, then Ælfweard would have no rival, and Æthelhelm’s family would rule in Wessex.
So Æthelhelm the Younger had cause to want Æthelstan dead, but, if it were possible, he hated me even more than he detested Æthelstan, and I did not doubt he sought my death just as eagerly as he wished for Æthelstan’s. And it was not just the death of his father that had prompted his hatred, but the fate of his youngest sister, Ælswyth.
Ælswyth had been captured alongside her father, and, after his death, she chose to stay at Bebbanburg rather than return to her family in Wessex. ‘You can’t,’ I had told her.
‘Why not, lord?’ she had asked. I had summoned her and she had stood in front of me, so young, so pale, so vulnerable, so enchantingly beautiful.
‘You can’t stay,’ I had spoken harshly, ‘because I have an agreement with your family. You will be returned to them when the ransom is paid.’
‘But the ransom isn’t paid, lord.’
‘Your father is dead,’ I had insisted, and wondered why she showed so little grief, ‘so there can be no more ransom. You must go home, as agreed.’
‘And your grandchild must go too, lord?’ she had asked innocently.
I had frowned, not understanding. My only grandchildren, my daughter’s two children, were in Eoferwic. Then I did understand, and I had just stared at her. ‘You’re pregnant?’ I finally said.
And Ælswyth had smiled so very sweetly. ‘Yes, lord.’
‘Tell my son I’ll kill him.’
‘Yes, lord.’
‘But marry him first.’
‘Yes, lord.’
So they did marry, and in time a child was born, a boy, and as is the custom in our family he was named Uhtred. Æthelhelm the Younger immediately spread a new rumour, that we had raped Ælswyth and then forced her into the marriage. He called me Uhtred the Abductor, and no doubt he was believed in Wessex where men were ever ready to believe lies about Uhtred the Pagan. It was my belief that the summons from Edward that had required me to travel to Gleawecestre to pay homage for my Mercian lands had been an attempt to bring me within sword’s length of Æthelhelm’s revenge, but why lure me across Britain to Ceaster? He would have known I would bring warriors, and all he would have achieved was to combine my forces with Æthelstan’s men, making the task of slaughtering either of us that much harder.
I had no doubt that Æthelhelm the Younger had committed treason by hiring Welsh troops to kill his nephew’s rival. But it made no sense that he would have persuaded the monk to tell me the lies that had brought me across Britain to Ceaster.
Beneath us, on the arena’s floor, the first prisoner died. A stroke of a sword, a severed head and blood. So much blood. Æthelstan’s revenge had started.
Not every prisoner died, Æthelstan showed more sense than that. He killed those men he judged to be close to Cynlæf, but spared the youngest. Thirty-three men died, all put to the sword, and I remembered a day when I had handed Æthelstan my sword and told him to kill a man.
Æthelstan had been a boy with an unbroken voice, but I was training him to be a king. I had captured Eardwulf, also a rebel. It had happened not far from Ceaster, beside a ditch, and I had beaten Eardwulf down so that he lay half stunned in the scummy water. ‘Make it quick, boy,’ I had told Æthelstan. He had not killed before, but a boy must learn these skills, and a boy who would be king must learn to take life.
I thought about that day as I watched Cynlæf’s men die. All had been stripped of their mail, stripped of anything of value. They shivered as, one by one, they were led to their deaths. Æthelstan must have remembered that distant day too because he used his youngest warriors as his executioners, doubtless wanting them to learn the lesson he had learned beside that ditch, that killing a man is hard. Killing a helpless man with a sword takes resolve. You look into their eyes, see their fear, smell it too. And a man’s neck is tough. Few of the thirty-three died cleanly. Some were hacked to death, and the old arena smelled as it must have smelled when the Romans filled the tiered seats and cheered the men fighting on the sand below; a stink of blood, shit, and piss.
Æthelstan had killed Eardwulf quickly enough. He had not tried to hack off the rebel’s head, but had instead used Serpent-Breath to cut Eardwulf’s throat, and I had watched the ditch turn red. And Eardwulf had been Eadith’s brother, and Eadith was now my wife.
Cynlæf died last. I thought Æthelstan might kill the rebel leader himself, but instead he summoned his servant, a boy who would grow to be a warrior, and gave him the sword. Cynlæf’s hands were bound, and he had been forced to his knees. ‘Do it, boy,’ Æthelstan ordered, and I saw the youngster close his eyes as he swung the sword. He slammed the edge into Cynlæf’s skull, knocking him sideways and drawing blood, but Cynlæf had hardly been hurt. His left ear was sliced open, but the boy’s blow had lacked force. A priest, there were always priests with Æthelstan, raised his voice as he chanted a prayer. ‘Swing again, lad,’ Æthelstan said.
‘And keep your eyes open!’ I shouted.
It took seven blows to kill Cynlæf. Those of his men whom Æthelstan had spared would swear new oaths to a new lord, they would be Æthelstan’s men.
So the rebellion was defeated, at least in this part of Mercia. The fyrd, dragged from their fields and flocks, had gone to their homes leaving only melting snow, the ashes of campfires and Gruffudd’s Welshmen who waited beside Cynlæf’s tents.
‘He calls himself a king,’ I told Æthelstan as we walked towards the tents.
‘Kingship comes from God,’ Æthelstan said. I was surprised by that response. I had merely been trying to amuse him, but Æthelstan was in a grim mood after the killings. ‘He should have told us he was a king last night,’ he said disapprovingly.
‘He was in a humble mood,’ I said, ‘and wanted a favour. Besides, he’s probably king of three dung heaps, a ditch, and a midden. Nothing more.’
‘I still owe him respect. He’s a Christian king.’
‘He’s a mucky Welsh chieftain,’ I said, ‘who calls himself a king until someone who owns two more dung heaps than he does comes and slices his head off. And he’d slice your head off too if he could. You can’t trust the Welsh.’
‘I didn’t say I trusted him, merely that I respect him. God endows men with kingship, even in Wales.’ And, to my horror, Æthelstan stopped a few paces from Gruffudd and bowed his head. ‘Lord King,’ he said.
Gruffudd liked the gesture and grinned. He also saw his son who was still guarded by Folcbald and Oswi. He said something in Welsh that none of us understood.
‘Gruffudd of Gwent begs you to release his son, lord Prince,’ Father Bledod translated.
‘He agreed to give us a name first,’ Æthelstan said, ‘and his chain, and a pledge that he will keep the peace for a year.’
Gruffudd must have understood Æthelstan’s words because he immediately took the gold links from around his neck, handed them to Bledod, who, in turn, gave them to Æthelstan, who immediately handed the chain to Father Swithred. Then Gruffudd began telling a tale that Father Bledod did his best to interpret even as it was being told. It was a long tale, but the gist of it was that a priest had come from Mercia to talk with King Arthfael of Gwent, and an agreement had been made, gold had been given, and Arthfael had summoned his kinsman, Gruffudd, and ordered him to take his best warriors north to Ceaster.
‘The king,’ Æthelstan interrupted at one point, ‘says the priest came from Mercia?’
That provoked a hurried discussion in Welsh. ‘The priest offered us gold,’ Father Bledod told Æthelstan, ‘good gold! Enough gold to fill a helmet, lord Prince, and to earn it we simply had to come here to fight.’
‘I asked if the priest was from Mercia,’ Æthelstan insisted.
‘He was from the sais,’ Bledod said.
‘So he could have been a West Saxon?’ I asked.
‘He could, lord,’ Bledod said unhelpfully.
‘And the name of the priest?’ Æthelstan demanded.
‘Stigand, lord.’
Æthelstan turned and looked at me, but I shook my head. I had never heard of a priest named Stigand. ‘But I doubt the priest used his own name,’ I said.
‘So, we’ll never know,’ Æthelstan said bleakly.
Gruffudd was still speaking, indignant now. Father Bledod listened, then looked embarrassed. ‘Father Stigand is dead, lord Prince.’
‘Dead!’ Æthelstan exclaimed.
‘On his way home from Gwent, lord Prince, he was waylaid. King Gruffudd says he is not to blame. Why would he kill a man who might bring him more sais gold?’
‘Why indeed?’ Æthelstan asked. Had he expected to hear his enemy’s name? That was naive. He knew as well as I did that Æthelhelm the Younger was the likely culprit, but Æthelhelm was no fool, and would have taken care to conceal the treachery of hiring men to fight against his own king. So the man who had negotiated with Arthfael of Gwent was dead, and the dead take their secrets to the grave.
‘Lord Prince,’ Bledod asked nervously, ‘the king’s son?’
‘Tell King Gruffudd of Gwent,’ Æthelstan said, ‘that he may have his son.’
‘Thank you—’ Bledod began.
‘And tell him,’ Æthelstan interrupted, ‘that if he fights again for men who rebel against my father’s throne then I will lead an army into Gwent and I will lay Gwent waste and turn it into a land of death.’
‘I will tell him, lord Prince,’ Bledod said, though none of us who were listening believed for one heartbeat that the threat would be translated.
‘Then go,’ Æthelstan commanded.
The Welshmen left. The sun was higher now, melting the snow, though it was still cold. A blustery wind came from the east to lift the banners hanging from Ceaster’s walls. I had crossed Britain to rescue a man who did not need rescuing. I had been tricked. But by whom? And why?
I had another enemy, a secret enemy, and I had danced to his drumbeat. Wyrd bið ful a¯ræd.
Three
The next day dawned bright and cold, the pale sky only discoloured by smoke from the fires as Æthelstan’s men burned the remnants of Cynlæf’s encampment. Finan and I, mounted on horses captured from the rebels, rode slowly through the destruction. ‘When do we leave?’ Finan asked.
‘As soon as we can.’
‘The horses could do with a rest.’
‘Maybe tomorrow, then.’
‘That soon?’
‘I’m worried about Bebbanburg,’ I confessed. ‘Why else would someone drag me across Britain?’
‘Bebbanburg’s safe,’ Finan insisted. ‘I still think it was Æthelhelm who tricked you.’
‘Hoping I’d be killed here?’
‘What else? He can’t kill you while you’re inside Bebbanburg, so he has to get you outside the walls somehow.’
‘I spend enough time with Stiorra and her children,’ I pointed out. My daughter, Queen of Northumbria, lived in Eoferwic’s rambling palace, which was a mix of Roman grandeur and solid timber halls.
‘He can’t reach you in Eoferwic either. He wanted you out of Northumbria.’
‘Maybe you’re right,’ I said, unconvinced.
‘I’m always right. I’m from Ireland. I was right about the snow, wasn’t I? And I’m still waiting for the two shillings.’
‘You’re a Christian. Patience is one of your virtues.’
‘I must be a living saint then.’ He looked past me. ‘And talking of saints.’
I twisted in the saddle to see Father Swithred approaching. The priest was mounted on a fine grey stallion that he rode well, calming the beast when it shied sideways as a man threw an armful of dirty thatch onto a fire. Smoke billowed and sparks flew. Father Swithred rode through the smoke and curbed the stallion near us. ‘The prince,’ he said brusquely, ‘requests your company today.’
‘Requests or requires?’ I asked.
‘It’s the same thing,’ Swithred said, and turned his horse, beckoning us to follow him.
I stayed where I was and held out a hand to check Finan. ‘Tell me,’ I called after Swithred, ‘you’re a West Saxon?’
‘You know I am,’ he said, turning back suspiciously.
‘Do you give orders to West Saxon ealdormen?’
He looked angry, but had the sense to suppress the fury. ‘The prince requests your company,’ he paused, ‘lord.’
‘Back in the city?’
‘He’s waiting at the north gate,’ Swithred said curtly, ‘we’re riding to Brunanburh.’
I spurred my horse alongside the priest’s grey. ‘I remember the day I first met you, priest,’ I said, ‘and Prince Æthelstan told me he didn’t trust you.’
He looked shocked at that. ‘I cannot believe—’ he began to protest.
‘Why would I lie?’ I interrupted him.
‘I am devoted to the prince,’ he said forcefully.
‘You were his father’s choice, not his.’
‘And does that matter?’ he asked. I deliberately did not answer, but just waited until, reluctantly, he added, ‘lord.’
‘The priests,’ I said, ‘write letters and read letters. Prince Æthelstan believed you were imposed on him to report back to his father.’
‘And so I was,’ Swithred admitted, ‘and I will tell you precisely what I report to the king. I tell him his eldest son is no bastard, that he is a good servant of Christ, that he is devoted to his father, and that he prays for his father. Why do you think his father trusts him with the command of Ceaster?’ He spoke passionately.
‘Do you know a monk called Brother Osric?’ I asked suddenly.
Swithred gave me a pitying look. He knew I had tried to trap him. ‘No, lord,’ he said, giving the last word a sour taste.
I tried another question. ‘So Æthelstan should be the next King of Wessex?’
‘That is not my decision. God appoints kings.’
‘And is your god helped in his choice by wealthy ealdormen?’
He knew I meant Æthelhelm the Younger. It had occurred to me that Swithred might be sending messages to Æthelhelm. I had no doubt that the ealdorman sought news of Æthelstan and probably had at least one sworn follower somewhere in Ceaster, and I was tempted to think it must be Swithred because the stern, bald priest disliked me so much, but his next words surprised me. ‘It’s my belief,’ he said, ‘that Lord Æthelhelm persuaded the king to give this command to the prince.’
‘Why?’
‘So he would fail, of course. The prince has three burhs to command, Ceaster, Brunanburh, and Mameceaster, and not sufficient men to garrison even one of them properly. He has rebels to contend with, and thousands of Norse settlers north of here. Dear God! He even has Norsemen settled on this peninsula!’
I could not hide my astonishment. ‘Here? On Wirhealum?’
Swithred shrugged. ‘You know what’s been happening on this coast? The Irish defeated the Norse settlers, drove many of them out, and so they came here.’ He gestured northwards. ‘Out beyond Brunanburh? There might be five hundred Norse settlers there, and even more north of the Mærse! And thousands more north of the Ribbel.’
‘Thousands?’ I asked. Of course I had heard stories of the Norse fleeing Ireland, but thought most had found refuge in the islands off the Scottish coast or in the wild valleys of Cumbraland. ‘The prince is letting his enemies settle on Mercian land? Pagan enemies?’
‘We have small choice,’ Swithred said calmly. ‘King Edward conquered East Anglia, now he’s King of Mercia, and he needs all his troops to put down unrest and to garrison the new burhs he’s making. He doesn’t have the men to fight every enemy, and these Norsemen are too numerous to fight. Besides, they’re beaten men. They were defeated by the Irish, they lost much of their wealth and many of their warriors in those defeats, and they crave peace. That’s why they’ve submitted to us.’
‘For now,’ I said sourly. ‘Did any of them join Cynlæf?’
‘Not one. Ingilmundr could have led his men against us or he could have attacked Brunanburh. He did neither. Instead he kept his men at home.’
‘Ingilmundr?’ I asked.
‘A Norseman,’ Swithred said dismissively. ‘He’s the chieftain who holds land beyond Brunanburh.’
I found it difficult to believe that Norse invaders had been allowed to settle so close to Brunanburh and Ceaster. King Edward’s ambition, which was the same as his father King Alfred’s, was to drive the pagan foreigners out of Saxon territory, yet here they were on Ceaster’s doorstep. I supposed that ever since Æthelflaed’s death there had been no stable government in Mercia, Cynlæf’s rebellion was proof of that, and the Northmen were ever ready to take advantage of Saxon weakness. ‘Ingilmundr,’ I said forcefully, ‘whoever he is, might not have marched against you, but he could have come to your relief.’
‘The prince sent word that he was to do no such thing. We had no need of help, and we certainly had no need of pagan help.’
‘Even my help?’
The priest turned to me with a ferocious expression. ‘If a pagan wins our battles,’ he said vehemently, ‘then it suggests the pagan gods must have power! We must have faith! We must fight in the belief that Christ is sufficient!’
I had nothing to say to that. The men who fought for me worshipped a dozen gods and goddesses, the Christian god among them, but if a man believes the nonsense that there is only one god then there’s no point in arguing because it would be like discussing a rainbow with a blind man.
We had ridden to the north of the city where Æthelstan and a score of armed riders waited for us. Æthelstan greeted me cheerfully. ‘The sun’s shining, the rebels are gone, and God is good!’
‘And the rebels didn’t attack Brunanburh?’
‘So far as we know. That’s what we’re going to find out.’
For almost as long as I could remember, Ceaster had been the most northerly burh in Mercia, but Æthelflaed had built Brunanburh just a few miles north and west to guard the River Mærse. Brunanburh was a timber-walled fort, close enough to the river to protect a wooden wharf where warships could be kept. The purpose of the fort was to prevent Norsemen rowing up the Mærse, but if Swithred was right then all the land beyond Brunanburh between the Dee and the Mærse was now settled by pagan Norse. ‘Tell me about Ingilmundr,’ I demanded of Æthelstan as we rode.
I had asked the question in a truculent tone, but Æthelstan answered enthusiastically. ‘I like him!’
‘A pagan?’
He laughed at that. ‘I like you too, lord,’ he said, ‘sometimes.’ He spurred his horse off the road and onto a track that skirted the Roman cemetery. He glanced at the weather-worn graves and made the sign of the cross. ‘Ingilmundr’s father held land in Ireland. He and his men got beaten and driven to the sea. The father died, but Ingilmundr managed to bring off half his army with their families. I sent a message early this morning asking that he should meet us at Brunanburh because I want you to meet him. You’ll like him too!’
‘I probably will,’ I said. ‘He’s a Norseman and a pagan. But that makes him your enemy, and he’s an enemy living on your land.’
‘And he pays us tribute. And tribute weakens the payer and acknowledges his subservience.’
‘Cheaper in the long run,’ I said, ‘just to kill the bastards.’
‘Ingilmundr swore on his gods to live peaceably with us,’ Æthelstan continued, ignoring my comment.
I leaped on his words. ‘So you trust his gods? You accept they are real?’
‘They’re real to Ingilmundr, I suppose,’ Æthelstan said calmly. ‘Why make him take an oath on a god he doesn’t believe in? That just begs for the oath to be broken.’
I grunted at that. He was right, of course. ‘But no doubt part of the agreement,’ I said scathingly, ‘was that Ingilmundr accepts your damned missionaries.’
‘The damned missionaries are indeed part of the agreement,’ he said patiently. ‘We insist on that with every Norseman who settles south of the Ribbel. That’s why my father put a burh at Mameceaster.’
‘To protect missionaries?’ I asked, astonished.
‘To protect anyone who accepts Mercian rule,’ he said, still patient, ‘and punish anyone who breaks our law. The warriors protect our land, and the monks and priests teach folk about God and about God’s law. I’m building a convent there now.’
‘That will terrify the Northmen,’ I said sourly.
‘It will help bring Christian charity to a troubled land,’ Æthelstan retorted. His aunt, the Lady Æthelflaed, had always claimed the River Ribbel as Mercia’s northern frontier, though in truth the land between the Mærse and the Ribbel was wild and mostly ungoverned, its coast long settled by Danes who had often raided the rich farmlands around Ceaster. I had led plenty of war-bands north in revenge for those raids, once leading my men as far as Mameceaster, an old Roman fort on a sandstone hill beside the River Mædlak. King Edward had strengthened those old walls and put a garrison into Mameceaster’s fort. And thus, I reflected, the frontier of Mercia crept ever northwards. Ceaster had been the northernmost burh, then Brunanburh, and now it was Mameceaster, and that new burh on its sandstone hill was perilously close to my homeland, Northumbria. ‘Have you ever been to Mameceaster?’ Æthelstan asked me.