The Burning Land Part 22

The hatch slid fully open again. "Is that you, father?"

"It is, sister."

"Have manners vanished from the surface of G.o.d's earth?" she asked.

"He can't help it, sister," Pyrlig said, "he's just a brute." He grinned at me.

"Remove your foot," the woman demanded crossly, and when I obeyed she closed the hatch and I heard the locking bar being lifted. Then the gate creaked wide.

I climbed out of the saddle. "Wait," I told my men, and walked into the nunnery's courtyard. The gaunt church comprised the whole of the southern part, while the other three sides were edged with low timber buildings, thatched with straw, in which I a.s.sumed the nuns slept, ate, and spun wool. The nun, who introduced herself as the Abbess Werburgh, bowed to me. "You're truly a friend of the Lady aethelflaed?" she asked. She was an elderly woman, so small that she scarcely reached my waist, but she had a fierce face.

"I am."

Werburgh twitched with disapproval when she noticed the hammer of Thor hanging at my neck. "And your name?" she demanded, but just then a shriek sounded and a child hurtled out of a doorway and pelted across the puddled courtyard.

It was Stiorra, my daughter, and she threw herself at me, wrapping her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist. I was glad it was raining, or else the nun might have thought the drops on my face were tears. They were. "I knew you'd come," Stiorra said fiercely, "I knew, I knew, I knew."

"You're Lord Uhtred?" the abbess asked.

"Yes."

"Thank G.o.d," she said.

Stiorra was telling me of her adventures, and Osbert, my youngest, had run to me and was trying to climb my leg. Uhtred, my eldest son, was nowhere to be seen. I picked up Osbert and shouted for Finan to bring the other men inside. "I don't know how long we're staying," I told the Abbess Werburgh, "but the horses need stabling and food."

"You think we're a tavern?" she demanded.

"You won't leave again, will you?" Stiorra was asking insistently.

"No," I said, "no, no, no," and then I stopped talking because aethelflaed had appeared in a doorway, framed there by the darkness behind and even on that drab gray day it seemed to me that, though she was dressed in a cloak and hood of coa.r.s.e brown weave, she glowed.

And I remembered Iseult's prophecy made so many years ago, made when aethelflaed was no older than Stiorra, a prophecy made when Wess.e.x was at its weakest, when the Danes had overrun the country and Alfred was a fugitive in the marshes. Iseult, that strange and lovely woman, dark as shadows, had promised me that Alfred would give me power and that my woman would be a creature of gold.

And I stared at aethelflaed and she stared back, and I knew the promise I had made to my daughter was one I would keep. I would not leave.

I put my children down, warning them to stay away from the horses' hooves, and I walked across the puddled courtyard, oblivious of the nuns who had crept out to watch our arrival. I planned to bow to aethelflaed. She was, after all, a king's daughter and the wife of Mercia's ruler, but her face was at once tearful and happy and I did not bow. I held out my arms and she came to me, and I felt her body trembling as I held her close. Maybe she could feel my heart beating, for it seemed to me as loud as a great drumbeat. "You've come," she said.

"Yes."

"I knew you would."

I pushed back her hood to see her hair, as golden as mine. I smiled. "A creature of gold," I said.

"Foolish man," she said, smiling.

"What happens now?" I asked her.

"I imagine," she said, stepping gently away from me and pulling the hood back over her hair, "that my husband will try to kill you."

"And he can summon?" I asked, then paused to think, "fifteen hundred trained warriors?"

"At least that many."

"Then I see no difficulty," I said lightly. "I have at least forty men."

And that afternoon the first of the Mercian warriors came.

They arrived in groups, ten or twenty at a time, riding from the north and making a loose cordon about the nunnery. I watched them from the bell-tower, counting over a hundred warriors, and still more came. "The thirty men in the village," I asked aethelflaed, "they were here to keep you from leaving?"

"They were supposed to stop food reaching the nunnery," she said, "though they weren't very effective. Supplies came across the river by boat."

"They wanted to starve you?"

"My husband thought that would make me leave. Then I'd have to go back to him."

"Not to your father?"

She grimaced. "He would have sent me back to my husband, wouldn't he?"

"Would he?"

"Marriage is a sacrament, Uhtred," she said almost wearily, "it is sanctified by G.o.d, and you know my father won't offend G.o.d."

"So why didn't aethelred just drag you back?"

"Invade a nunnery? My father would disapprove of that!"

"He would," I said, watching a larger group of hors.e.m.e.n appear to the north.

"They thought my father would die at any moment," she said, and I knew she spoke of my cousin and his friend, Aldhelm, "and they were waiting for that."

"But your father lives."

"He recovers," aethelflaed said, "G.o.d be thanked."

"And here comes trouble," I said, because the new band of hors.e.m.e.n, at least fifty in number, rode beneath a banner, suggesting that whoever commanded the troops guarding the nunnery was coming himself. As the hors.e.m.e.n drew nearer, I saw the banner displayed a cross made of two big-bladed war axes. "Whose badge is that?"

"Aldhelm's," aethelflaed said flatly.

Two hundred men ringed the monastery now, and Aldhelm, riding a tall black stallion, placed himself fifty paces from the nunnery gates. He had a bodyguard of two priests and a dozen warriors. The warriors carried s.h.i.+elds that bore their lord's crossed-ax badge, and those grim men gathered just behind him and, like their lord, gazed in silence at the closed gates. Did Aldhelm know I was inside? He might have suspected, but I doubt he had any certainty. We had ridden fast through Mercia, keeping to the eastern half where the Danes were strongest, so few men in Saxon Mercia would realize I had come south. Yet perhaps Aldhelm suspected I was there, for he made no attempt to enter the nunnery, or else he was under orders not to offend his G.o.d by committing sacrilege. Alfred might forgive aethelred for making aethelflaed unhappy, but he would never forgive an insult to his G.o.d.

I went down to the courtyard. "What's he waiting for?" Finan asked me.

"Me," I said.

I dressed for war. I dressed in s.h.i.+ning mail, sword-belted, booted, with my wolf-crested helmet and my s.h.i.+eld with the wolf badge, and I chose to carry a war ax as well as my two scabbarded swords. I ordered one leaf of the convent gate to be opened, then walked out alone. I did not ride because I had not been able to buy a battle-trained stallion.

I walked in silence and Aldhelm's men watched me. If Aldhelm had possessed a sc.r.a.p of courage he should have ridden at me and chopped me down with the long sword hanging at his waist, and even without courage he could have ordered his personal guard to cut me down, but instead he just stared at me.

I stopped a dozen paces from him, then leaned the battle-ax on my shoulder. I had pushed open the hinged cheek-plates of my helmet so Aldhelm's men could see my face. "Men of Mercia!" I shouted so that not only Aldhelm's men could hear me, but the West Saxon troops across the river. "Any day now Jarl Haesten will lead an attack on your country! He comes with thousands of men, hungry men, spear-Danes, sword-Danes, Danes who would rape your wives, enslave your children, and steal your lands. They will make a greater army than the horde of warriors you defeated at Fearnhamme! How many of you were at Fearnhamme?"

Men glanced at each other, but none raised a hand or shouted that they had been present at that great victory.

"You're ashamed of your triumph?" I asked them. "You made a slaughter that will be remembered so long as men live in Mercia! And you are ashamed of it? How many of you were at Fearnhamme?"

Some found their courage then and lifted their arms, and one man cheered, and suddenly most of them were cheering. They cheered themselves. Aldhelm, confused, raised a hand to call for silence, but they ignored him.

"And who," I bellowed louder, "do you want to lead you against the Jarl Haesten who comes here with Vikings and pirates, with killers and slavers, with spears and axes, with murder and fire? It was the Lady aethelflaed who encouraged you to victory at Fearnhamme, and you want her locked in a nunnery? She begged me to come and fight with you again, and here I am, and you greet me with swords? With spears? So who do you want to lead you against Jarl Haesten and his killers?" I let that question hang for a few heartbeats, then I leveled the ax so it pointed at Aldhelm. "Do you want him?" I shouted, "or me?"

What a fool that man was. At that moment, in the remnants of rain that spat out of the west, he should have killed me fast, or else he should have embraced me. He could have leaped from his saddle and offered me friends.h.i.+p, and so pretended an alliance that would buy him the time during which he could arrange my death by stealth, but instead he showed fear. He was a coward, he had always been a coward, brave only when faced by the weak, and the fear was on his face, it was in his hesitation, and it was not till one of his followers leaned and whispered in his ear that he found his voice. "This man," he called, pointing at me, "is outlawed from Wess.e.x."

That was news to me, but it was not surprising. I had broken my oath to Alfred, so Alfred would have little choice but to declare me outlaw and thus prey to anyone with the courage to capture me. "So I'm an outlaw!" I shouted, "so come and kill me! And who will protect you from Jarl Haesten then?"

Aldhelm came to his senses then and muttered something to the man who had whispered to him, and that man, a big broad-shouldered warrior, spurred his horse forward. His sword was drawn. He knew what he was doing. He did not ride at me frantically, but deliberately. He came to kill me, and I could see his eyes judging me from deep in the shadow of his helmet. His sword was already drawn back, his arm tensed for the sweeping stroke that would crash into my s.h.i.+eld with the weight of man and horse behind the blade to throw me off balance. Then the horse would turn into me and the sword would come again from behind me, and he knew that I knew all that, but he was rea.s.sured when I raised my s.h.i.+eld, for that meant I would do what he expected me to do. I saw his mouth tighten and his heels nudge back and his stallion, a big gray beast, lunged ahead and the sword flashed in the dull air.

All the man's great strength was in that stroke. It came from my right. My s.h.i.+eld was in my left hand, the ax in my right. I did two things.

I dropped onto one knee and lifted the s.h.i.+eld over my head so it was almost flat above my helmet, and at the same moment I lunged the ax into the horse's legs and let go of the haft.

The sword slammed onto my s.h.i.+eld, skidded across the wood, clanged against the boss, and just then the horse, the ax tangled in its rear legs, whinnied and stumbled. I saw blood bright on a fetlock, and I was already standing as the horseman slashed again, but he and his horse were off balance and the stroke screeched harmlessly off the iron rim of my s.h.i.+eld. Aldhelm shouted at men to help his champion, but Finan, Sihtric, and Osferth were already out of the convent's gate, mounted and armed, and Aldhelm's men hesitated as I took a pace toward the horseman. He slashed again, still hampered by his horse's skittishness, and this time I let my s.h.i.+eld glance the blow downward and simply reached out and grasped the horseman's wrist. He shouted in alarm, and I pulled hard. He fell from the saddle, crashed onto the damp street and, for a heartbeat, looked dazed. His stallion, whinnying, twisted away as the man stood. His s.h.i.+eld, looped onto his left arm, was streaked with mud.

I had stepped back. I drew Serpent-Breath, the blade hissing in the scabbard's tight throat. "What's your name?" I asked. More of my men were coming from the nunnery, though Finan held them back.

The man rushed at me, hoping to throw me off balance with his s.h.i.+eld, but I stepped aside and let him go past me. "What's your name?" I asked again.

"Beornoth," he told me.

"Were you at Fearnhamme?" I asked, and he gave a curt nod. "I didn't come here to kill you, Beornoth," I said.

"I'm sworn to my lord," he said.

"An unworthy lord," I told him.

"You should know," he said, "you breaker of oaths," and with that he attacked again, and I raised my s.h.i.+eld to take the stroke and he dropped his arm fast, taking the sword beneath my s.h.i.+eld and the blade slammed into my calf, but I have always worn strips of iron sewn into my boots because the stroke beneath the s.h.i.+eld is such a danger. Some men wear leg armor, but that display will deter an enemy from the stroke beneath the s.h.i.+eld, while hidden strips of iron make the legs look vulnerable and invite the stroke, which opens the enemy to destruction. My strips stopped Beornoth's sword dead and he looked surprised as I rammed Serpent-Breath's hilt to hit him in the face with my gloved fist that was closed about the sword's handle. He staggered back. My left leg was aching from his blow, but he was bleeding from a broken nose and I slammed the s.h.i.+eld into him, forcing him back again, then I bullied him again with the s.h.i.+eld and this time he fell backward and I kicked his sword arm aside, put a foot on his belly, and placed Serpent-Breath's tip at his mouth. He stared up at me with hatred. He was wondering if he had time to sweep the sword up at me, but he knew there was no time left. I had but to move my hand and he would be choking on his own blood.

"Stay still, Beornoth," I said softly, then looked at Aldhelm's men. "I didn't come here to kill Mercians!" I shouted. "I came here to fight Jarl Haesten!" I stepped away and took my sword from Beornoth's face. "Get up," I told him. He stood uncertainly, not sure whether the fight was over or not. The hatred was gone from his eyes, now he was just staring at me with puzzlement. "Go," I said.

"I am sworn to kill you," he said.

"Don't be a fool, Beornoth," I said wearily, "I just gave you your life. That makes you mine." I turned my back on him. "The Lord Aldhelm," I shouted, "sends a brave man to do what he dares not do! Would you be led by a coward?"

There were men here who remembered me, not just from Fearnhamme, but from the attack on Lundene. These were warriors, and all warriors want to be led by a man who brings them success. Aldhelm was no warrior. They knew that, but they were still confused and uncertain. All of these Mercians were sworn to Aldhelm and some had become wealthy from his gifts. Those men kicked their horses close to their lord and I saw their hands reaching for sword hilts.

"At Fearnhamme," a voice called from behind me, "the Lord Aldhelm wished to run away. Is he the man to protect us?" It was aethelflaed, mounted on my horse and still wearing her drab convent clothes, though with her bright hair uncovered. "Who was it that led you to the slaughter?" she demanded, "who protected your homes? Who protected your wives and your children? Who would you rather serve?"

Someone from among the Mercian warriors shouted my name, and a cheer followed. Aldhelm had lost and he knew it. He shouted at Beornoth to kill me, but Beornoth stayed still and so Aldhelm, his voice desperate, ordered his supporters to cut me down.

"You don't want to fight each other!" I shouted, "you'll have real enemies enough soon!"

"G.o.d d.a.m.n you," one of Aldhelm's men snarled. He drew his sword and spurred his horse, and his action broke the uncertainty. More swords were drawn and it was suddenly chaos.

Men made their decisions, either for or against Aldhelm, and the vast majority were against him. They turned on his guards just as the man attacking me slashed with his sword. I deflected the blow with my s.h.i.+eld as the hors.e.m.e.n swirled around me in a clash of blades. Finan took care of my attacker. Osferth, I noted, had put his horse in front of aethelflaed so he could protect his half-sister, but she was in no danger. It was Aldhelm's men who were being hacked down, though Aldhelm himself, in pure panic, managed to kick his horse free of the sudden and savage fight. His sword was drawn, but all he wanted was to escape, but there were men all around him and then, seeing me, he realized his advantage, that he was on horseback and I was not, and he drove his spurs back and came to kill me.

He attacked with the despair of a man who did not believe he could win. He did not gauge me, as Beornoth had, but just came as fast as he could and hacked with his sword as strongly as he was able, and I met the ma.s.sive blow by holding Serpent-Breath upright. I knew that sword, I knew her strength, I had watched as Ealdwulf the Smith had forged the four rods of iron and three of steel into one long blade. I had fought with her, I had killed with her, and I had matched her against the blades of Saxons, Danes, Nors.e.m.e.n, and Frisians. I knew her and I trusted her, and when Aldhelm's sword met her with a clang that must have been heard far across the river, I knew what would happen.

His sword broke. It shattered. The broken end, two thirds of the blade, struck my helmet and fell to the mud, then I was pursuing Aldhelm who, holding a stump of sword, tried to flee, but there was no escape. The fight was over. The men who had supported him were either dead or disarmed, and the warriors who had sided with me formed a circle that ringed the two of us. Aldhelm curbed his stallion and stared at me. He opened his mouth, but could find no words. "Down," I told him, and when he hesitated, I shouted it again, "down!" I looked at Beornoth who had recovered his horse. "Give him your sword," I ordered.

Aldhelm was unsteady on his feet. He had a s.h.i.+eld and now he had Beornoth's sword, but there was no fight in him. He was whimpering. There was no pleasure in killing such a man and so I made it quick. One thrust above his crossed-ax s.h.i.+eld, which made him lift it and I dropped Serpent-Breath before the blade struck and cut instead into his left ankle with enough force to topple him. He fell to one knee and Serpent-Breath took him on the side of his neck. He wore a mail hood beneath his helmet, and the links did not split, but the blow drove him into a puddle and I struck again, this time breaking the neck-mail so that his blood misted and splashed across the nearest hors.e.m.e.n. He was shaking and crying, and I sawed the blade toward me until the blade's point was in the ragged wound of blood and mangled mail, then I thrust her down hard into his gullet where I twisted her. He was quivering, bleeding like a pig, and then he was dead.

I threw his banner into the Temes, then cupped my hands and shouted at the men across the river. "Tell Alfred that Uhtred of Bebbanburg has returned!"

Only now I was fighting for Mercia.

aethelflaed insisted that Aldhelm receive a Christian burial. There was a small church in the village, little more than a cattle byre with a cross nailed to its gable, and around it was a graveyard where we dug six graves for the six dead men. The existing graves were badly marked and one of the spades sliced into a corpse, tearing the woolen shroud and spilling stinking fat and ribs. We lay Aldhelm into that grave and, because so many of the Mercians had been his men and I did not want to strain their loyalty any further, I let him be buried in his fine clothes and mail coat. I kept his helmet, a gold chain, and his horse. Father Pyrlig prayed above the fresh burials, and then we could leave. My cousin was evidently at his estate near Gleawecestre, and so we rode there. I now led over two hundred men, mostly Mercians and, doubtless, in my cousin's eyes, rebels. "You want me to kill aethelred?" I asked aethelflaed.

"No!" She sounded shocked.

"Why not?"

"Do you want to be Lord of Mercia?" she retorted.

"No."

"He is the chief Ealdorman of Mercia," aethelflaed said, "and my husband." She shrugged. "I may not like him, but I am wedded to him."

"You can't be wedded to a dead man," I said.

"Murder is still a sin," aethelflaed said gently.

"Sin," I said scornfully.

"Some sins are so bad," she said, "that a lifetime's penance isn't enough to redeem them."

"Then let me do the sinning," I suggested.

"I know what's in your heart," she said, "and if I don't stop you then I am as guilty as you."

I growled some retort, then nodded curtly to folk who knelt as we pa.s.sed through their village that was all thatch, dung, and pigs. The villagers had no idea who we were, but they recognized mail and weapons and s.h.i.+elds. They would be holding their breath till we had gone, but soon, I thought, the Danes might come this way and the thatch would be burned and the children taken for slaves.

"When you die," aethelflaed said, "you'll want a sword in your hand."

"Of course."

"Why?"

"You know why."

"So you'll go to Valhalla. When I die, Uhtred, I want to go to heaven. Would you deny me that?"