LITMIR.BIZ

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king, had marched westwards to meet the forces of the pretender Ælla, and in the absence of the king they had taken the city. It would not have been difficult for them to have discovered Osbert’s absence. The trouble between Osbert and Ælla had been brewing for weeks, and Eoferwic was filled with traders, many from across the sea, who would have known of the two men’s bitter rivalry. One thing I learned about the Danes was that they knew how to spy. The monks who write the chronicles tell us that they came from nowhere, their dragon-prowed ships suddenly appearing from a blue vacancy, but it was rarely like that. The Viking crews might attack unexpectedly, but the big fleets, the war fleets, went where they knew there was already trouble. They found an existing wound and filled it like maggots.

      My father took me close to the city, he and a score of his men, all of us mounted and all wearing mail or leather. We could see the enemy on the wall. Some of the wall was built of stone, that was the Roman work, but much of the city was protected by an earth wall, topped by a high wooden palisade, and to the east of the city part of that palisade was missing. It seemed to have been burned for we could see charred wood on top of the earthen wall where fresh stakes had been driven to hold the new palisade that would replace the burned fence.

      Beyond the new stakes was a jumble of thatched roofs, the wooden bell towers of three churches and, on the river, the masts of the Danish fleet. Our scouts claimed there were thirty-four ships, which was said to mean the Danes had an army of around a thousand men. Our own army was larger, nearer to fifteen hundred, though it was difficult to count. No one seemed to be in charge. The two leaders, Osbert and Ælla, camped apart and, though they had officially made peace, they refused to speak to each other, communicating instead through messengers. My father, the third most important man in the army, could talk to both, but he was not able to persuade Osbert and Ælla to meet, let alone agree on a plan of campaign. Osbert wished to besiege the city and starve the Danes out, while Ælla urged an immediate attack. The rampart was broken, he said, and an assault would drive deep into the tangle of streets where the Danes could be hunted down and killed. I do not know which course my father preferred, for he never said, but in the end the decision was taken away from us.

      Our army could not wait. We had brought some food, but that was soon exhausted, and men were going ever farther afield to find more, and some of those men did not return. They just slipped home. Other men grumbled that their farms needed work and if they did not return home they would face a hungry year. A meeting was called of every important man and they spent all day arguing. Osbert attended the meeting, which meant Ælla did not, though one of his chief supporters was there and hinted that Osbert’s reluctance to assault the city was caused by cowardice. Perhaps it was, for Osbert did not respond to the jibe, proposing instead that we dug our own forts outside the city. Three or four such forts, he said, would trap the Danes. Our best fighters could man the forts, and our other men could go home to look after their fields. Another man proposed building a new bridge across the river, a bridge that would trap the Danish fleet, and he argued the point tediously, though I think everyone knew that we did not have the time to make a bridge across such a wide river. ‘Besides,’ King Osbert said, ‘we want the Danes to take their ships away. Let them go back to the sea. Let them go and trouble someone else.’ A bishop pleaded for more time, saying that Ealdorman Egbert, who held land south of Eoferwic, had yet to arrive with his men.

      ‘Nor is Ricsig here,’ a priest said, speaking of another great lord.

      ‘He’s sick,’ Osbert said.

      ‘Sickness of courage,’ Ælla’s spokesman sneered.

      ‘Give them time,’ the bishop suggested. ‘With Egbert’s and Ricsig’s men we shall have enough troops to frighten the Danes with sheer numbers.’

      My father said nothing at the meeting, though it was plain many men wanted him to speak, and I was perplexed that he stayed silent, but that night Beocca explained why. ‘If he said we should attack,’ the priest said, ‘then men would assume he had sided with Ælla, while if he encouraged a siege, he would be seen to be on Osbert’s side.’

      ‘Does it matter?’

      Beocca looked at me across the campfire, or one of his eyes looked at me while the other wandered somewhere in the night. ‘When the Danes are beaten,’ he said, ‘then Osbert and Ælla’s feud will start again. Your father wants none of it.’

      ‘But whichever side he supports,’ I said, ‘will win.’

      ‘But suppose they kill each other?’ Beocca asked, ‘who will be king then?’

      I looked at him, understood, said nothing.

      ‘And who will be king thereafter?’ Beocca asked, and he pointed at me. ‘You. And a king should be able to read and write.’

      ‘A king,’ I answered scornfully, ‘can always hire men who can read and write.’

      Then, next morning, the decision to attack or besiege was made for us, because news came that more Danish ships had appeared at the mouth of the River Humber, and that could only mean the enemy would be reinforced within a few days, and so my father, who had stayed silent for so long, finally spoke. ‘We must attack,’ he told both Osbert and Ælla, ‘before the new boats come.’

      Ælla, of course, agreed enthusiastically, and even Osbert understood that the new ships meant that everything was changed. Besides, the Danes inside the city had been having problems with their new wall. We woke one morning to see a whole new stretch of palisade, the wood raw and bright, but a great wind blew that day and the new work collapsed, and that caused much merriment in our encampments. The Danes, men said, could not even build a wall. ‘But they can build ships,’ Father Beocca told me.

      ‘So?’

      ‘A man who can build a ship,’ the young priest said, ‘can usually build a wall. It is not so hard as shipbuilding.’

      ‘It fell down!’

      ‘Perhaps it was meant to fall down,’ Beocca said, and, when I just stared at him, he explained. ‘Perhaps they want us to attack there?’

      I do not know if he told my father of his suspicions, but if he did then I have no doubt my father dismissed them. He did not trust Beocca’s opinions on war. The priest’s usefulness was in encouraging God to smite the Danes and that was all and, to be fair, Beocca did pray mightily and long that God would give us the victory.

      And the day after the wall collapsed we gave God his chance to fulfil Beocca’s prayers.

      We attacked.

      I do not know if every man who assaulted Eoferwic was drunk, but they would have been had there been enough mead, ale and birch wine to go round. The drinking had gone on much of the night and I woke to find men vomiting in the dawn. Those few who, like my father, possessed mail shirts pulled them on. Most were armoured in leather, while some men had no protection other than their coats. Weapons were sharpened on whetstones. The priests walked round the camp scattering blessings, while men swore oaths of brotherhood and loyalty. Some banded together and promised to share their plunder equally, a few looked pale and more than a handful sneaked away through the dykes that crossed the flat, damp landscape.

      A score of men were ordered to stay at the camp and guard the women and horses, though Father Beocca and I were both ordered to mount. ‘You’ll stay on horseback,’ my father told me, ‘and you’ll stay with him,’ he added to the priest.

      ‘Of course, my lord,’ Beocca said.

      ‘If anything happens,’ my father was deliberately vague, ‘then ride to Bebbanburg, shut the gate and wait there.’

      ‘God is on our side,’ Beocca said.

      My father looked a great warrior, which indeed he was, though he claimed to be getting too old for fighting. His greying beard jutted over his mail coat, above which he had hung a crucifix carved from ox bone that had been a gift from Gytha. His sword belt was leather studded with silver, while his great sword, Bone-Breaker, was sheathed in leather banded with gilt-bronze strappings. His boots had iron plates on either side of the ankles, reminding me of his advice about the

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