LITMIR.BIZ

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was the same ship that had shamed us, and she tried the same trick again, but this time I turned Heahengel into her and our bows smashed into her quarter and our twelve archers were loosing shafts into her crew. Heahengel had ridden up over the other ship, half sinking her and pinning her down, and Leofric led a charge over the prow, and there was blood thickening the water in the Viking bilge. Two of our men managed to tie the ships together which meant I could leave the steering oar and, without bothering to put on either helmet or mail coat, I jumped aboard with Serpent-Breath and joined the fight. There were shields clashing in the wide midships, spears jabbing, swords and axes swinging, arrows flighting overhead, men screaming, men dying, the rage of battle, the joy of blade song and it was all over before Ceruphin or Cristenlic could join us.

      How I did love it. To be young, to be strong, to have a good sword and to survive. The Danish crew had been forty-six strong and all but one died, and he only lived because Leofric bellowed that we must take a prisoner. Three of our men died, and six were foully wounded and they probably all died once we got them ashore, but we bailed out the Viking ship and went back to Hamtun with her in tow, and in her blood-drenched belly we found a chest of silver that she had stolen from a monastery on Wiht. Leofric presented a generous amount to the bowmen, so that when we went ashore and were confronted by the reeve, who demanded that we give up the archers, only two of them wanted to go. The rest could see their way to becoming wealthy, and so they stayed.

      The prisoner was called Hroi. His lord, whom we had killed in the battle, had been called Thurkil and he served Guthrum, who was in East Anglia where he now called himself king of that country. ‘Does he still wear the bone in his hair?’ I asked.

      ‘Yes, lord,’ Hroi said. He did not call me lord because I was an Ealdorman, for he did not know that. He called me lord because he did not want me to kill him when the questioning was done.

      Hroi did not think Guthrum would attack this year. ‘He waits for Halfdan,’ he told me.

      ‘And Halfdan’s where?’

      ‘In Ireland, lord.’

      ‘Avenging Ivar?’

      ‘Yes, lord.’

      ‘You know Kjartan?’

      ‘I know three men so called, lord.’

      ‘Kjartan of Northumbria,’ I said, ‘father of Sven.’

      ‘Earl Kjartan, you mean?’

      ‘He calls himself Earl now?’ I asked.

      ‘Yes, lord, and he is still in Northumbria.’

      ‘And Ragnar? Son of Ragnar the Fearless?’

      ‘Earl Ragnar is with Guthrum, lord, in East Anglia. He has four boats.’

      We chained Hroi and sent him under guard to Wintanceaster for Alfred liked to talk with Danish prisoners. I do not know what happened to him. He was probably hanged or beheaded, for Alfred did not extend Christian mercy to pagan pirates.

      And I thought of Ragnar the Younger, Earl Ragnar now, and wondered if I would meet his boats on the Wessex coast, and wondered too whether Hroi had lied and that Guthrum would invade that summer. I thought he would, for there was much fighting across the island of Britain. The Danes of Mercia had attacked the Britons in north Wales, I never did discover why, and other Danish bands raided across the West Saxon frontier, and I suspected those raids were meant to discover West Saxon weaknesses before Guthrum launched his Great Army, but no army came and, as the summer reached its height, Alfred felt safe enough to leave his forces in North Wessex to visit the fleet.

      His arrival coincided with news that seven Danish ships had been seen off Heilincigae, an island which lay in shallow waters not far to Hamtun’s east, and the news was confirmed when we saw smoke rising from a pillaged settlement. Only half our ships were in Hamtun, the others were at sea, and one of the six in port, the Evangelista, was on the hard having her bottom scraped. Hacca was nowhere near Hamtun, gone to his brother’s house probably, and he would doubtless be annoyed that he had missed the king’s visit, but Alfred had given us no warning of his arrival, probably because he wanted to see us as we really were, rather than as we would have been had we known he was coming. As soon as he heard about the Danes off Heilincigae he ordered us all to sea and boarded Heahengel along with two of his guards and three priests, one of whom was Beocca who came to stand beside the steering oar.

      ‘You’ve got bigger, Uhtred,’ he said to me, almost reproachfully. I was a good head taller than him now, and much broader in the chest.

      ‘If you rowed, father,’ I said, ‘you’d get bigger.’

      He giggled. ‘I can’t imagine myself rowing,’ he said, then pointed at my steering oar. ‘Is that difficult to manage?’ he asked.

      I let him take it and suggested he turned the boat slightly to the steorbord and his crossed eyes widened in astonishment as he tried to push the oar and the water fought against him. ‘It needs strength,’ I said, taking the oar back.

      ‘You’re happy, aren’t you?’ He made it sound like an accusation.

      ‘I am, yes.’

      ‘You weren’t meant to be,’ he said.

      ‘No?’

      ‘Alfred thought this experience would humble you.’

      I stared at the king who was up in the bows with Leofric, and I remembered the king’s honeyed words about me having something to teach these crews, and I realised he had known I had nothing to contribute, yet he had still given me the helmet and armour. That, I assumed, was so I would give him a year of my life in which he hoped Leofric would knock the arrogance out of my bumptious youthfulness. ‘Didn’t work, did it?’ I said, grinning.

      ‘He said you must be broken like a horse.’

      ‘But I’m not a horse, father, I’m a lord of Northumbria. What did he think? That after a year I’d be a meek Christian ready to do his bidding?’

      ‘Is that such a bad thing?’

      ‘It’s a bad thing,’ I said. ‘He needs proper men to fight the Danes, not praying lickspittles.’

      Beocca sighed, then made the sign of the cross because poor Father Willibald was feeding the gulls with his vomit. ‘It’s time you were married, Uhtred,’ Beocca said sternly.

      I looked at him in astonishment. ‘Married! Why do you say that?’

      ‘You’re old enough,’ Beocca said.

      ‘So are you,’ I retorted, ‘and you’re not married, so why should I be?’

      ‘I live in hope,’ Beocca said. Poor man, he had a squint, a palsied hand and a face like a sick weasel, which really did not make him a great favourite with women. ‘But there is a young woman in Defnascir you should look at,’ he told me enthusiastically, ‘a very well born young lady! A charming creature, and,’ he paused, evidently having run out of the girl’s qualities, or else because he could not invent any new ones, ‘her father was the shire reeve, rest his soul. A lovely girl. Mildrith, she’s called.’ He smiled at me expectantly.

      ‘A reeve’s daughter,’ I said flatly. ‘The king’s reeve? The shire reeve?’

      ‘Her father was reeve of southern Defnascir,’ Beocca said, sliding the man down the social ladder, ‘but he left Mildrith property. A fair piece of land near Exanceaster.’

      ‘A reeve’s daughter,’ I repeated, ‘not an Ealdorman’s daughter?’

      ‘She’s sixteen, I believe,’ Beocca said, gazing at the shingled beach sliding away to our east.

      ‘Sixteen,’ I said scathingly, ‘and unmarried, which suggests she has a face like a bag of maggots.’

      ‘That is hardly relevant,’ he said crossly.

      ‘You don’t have to sleep with her,’

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