The Lords of the North (39 page)

I ran forward, then saw I had nothing to do.

The Christians often talk of miracles and I have always wanted to witness one such piece
of magic. They claim the blind can be given their sight, the cripple made to walk and the
leper healed. I have heard them tell stories of men walking on water, and even of dead men
raised alive from their graves, but I have never seen such things. If I had seen that great
magic then I would be a Christian today, but the priests tell me we must have faith instead.
But that day, in the relentless rain, I saw a thing which was as close to a miracle as ever I
witnessed.

Father Beocca, the skirts of his priest's robes filthy with mud, limped into the press of
vicious hounds. They had been sent to attack him, and Thyra was screaming at them to kill, but
he ignored the beasts and they simply shrank away from him. They whimpered as though they
feared this squint-eyed cripple and he hobbled calmly through their fangs and did not take
his eyes off Thyra whose screeching voice faded to a whimper and then to great sobs. Her cloak
was open, showing her scarred nakedness, and Beocca took off his own rain-sodden cloak and
draped it about her shoulders. She had her hands at her face. She was still weeping, and the
hounds bayed in sympathy, and Ragnar just watched. I thought Beocca would lead Thyra away,
but instead he took her head in his two hands and he suddenly shook her. He shook her hard,
and as he did he cried to the clouds. 'Lord,' he shouted, 'take this demon from her! Take the
evil one away! Spare her from Abaddon's grip!' She screamed then and the hounds put their heads
back and howled at the rain. Ragnar was motionless. Beocca shook Thyra's head again, shook it
so hard that I thought he might break her neck. Take the fiend from her, Lord!' he called.
'Release her to your love and to your great mercy!' He stared upwards. His crippled hand was
gripping Thyra's hair with its dead ivy strands, and he pushed her head backwards and forwards
as he chanted in a voice as loud as a warrior lord on a field of slaughter. 'In the name of
the Father,' he shouted, 'and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, I command you, foul demons,
to come from this girl. I cast you into the pit! I banish you! I send you to hell for
evermore and a day, and I do it in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost! Be gone!'

And Thyra suddenly began to cry. Not to scream and sob and gasp and struggle for breath,
but just a gentle weeping, and she laid her head on Beocca's shoulder and he put his arms
about her and cradled her and looked at us with resentment as if we, bloodstained and armed
and fierce, were the allies of the demons he had banished. 'She's all right now,' he said
awkwardly, 'she's all right now. Oh, go away!' This peevish command was to the hounds and,
astonishingly, they obeyed him, slinking away and leaving Ragnar unthreatened.

'We must get her warm,' Beocca said, 'and we must get her dressed properly.'

'Yes,' I said, 'we must.'

'Well, if you won't do it,' Beocca said indignantly, because I had not moved,

'then I shall.' And he led Thyra towards Kjartan's hall where the smoke still sifted from
the roof-hole. Ragnar made to go after them, but I shook my head and he stopped. I put my
right foot on Kjartan's dead belly and yanked Heart-Breaker free. I gave the sword to Ragnar
and he embraced me, but there was little elation in either of us. We had done the
impossible, we had taken Dunholm, but Ivarr still lived and Ivarr was the greater
enemy.

'What do I say to Thyra?' Ragnar asked me.

'You tell her the truth,' I said, because I did not know what else to say, and then I went to
find Gisela.

Gisela and Brida washed Thyra. They washed her body and her hair, and they took the dead ivy
away and they combed her golden hair, and then they dried it before the great fire in
Kjartan's hall, and afterwards they dressed her in a simple woollen robe and a cloak of
otter fur. Ragnar then talked with her beside the fire. They talked alone and I walked with
Father Beocca outside the hall. It had stopped raining. 'Who is Abaddon?' I asked him.

'I was responsible for your education,' he said, 'and I am ashamed of myself. How could
you not know that?'

'Well I don't,' I said, 'so who is he?'

'The dark angel of the bottomless pit, of course. I'm sure I told you that. He's the first
demon who will torment you if you don't repent and become a Christian.'

'You're a brave man, father,' I told him.

'Nonsense.'

'I tried to reach her,' I said, 'but I was scared of the hounds. They killed thirty or more
men today and you just walked into them.'

'They're only dogs,' he said dismissively. 'If God and Saint Cuthbert can't protect me
from dogs, what can they do?'

I stopped him, put both my hands on his shoulders and squeezed. 'You were very brave,
father,' I insisted, 'and I salute you.'

Beocca was enormously pleased with the compliment, but tried to look modest.

'I just prayed,' he said, 'and God did the rest.' I let him go and he walked on, kicking at a
fallen spear with his club foot. 'I didn't think the dogs would hurt me,' he said, 'because
I've always liked dogs. I had one as a child.'

'You should get yourself another one,' I said. 'A dog would be company for you.'

'I couldn't work as a small boy.' he went on as though I had not spoken.

'Well, I could pick stones and scare birds off newly scattered seed, but I couldn't do
proper work. The dog was my friend, but he died. Some other boys killed it.' He blinked a few
times. Thyra's a pretty woman, isn't she?' he said, sounding wistful.

'She is now.' I agreed.

'Those scars on her arms and legs,' he said, 'I thought Kjartan or Sven had cut her. But it
wasn't them. She did it to herself.'

'She cut herself?' I asked.

: 'Slashed herself with knives, she told me. Why would she do that?'

'To make herself ugly?' I suggested.

'But she isn't,' Beocca said, puzzled. 'She's beautiful.'

'Yes,' I said, 'she is.' and again I felt sorry for Beocca. He was getting old and he had
always been crippled and ugly, and he had always wanted to marry, and no woman had ever
come to him. He should have been a monk and thus forbidden to marry. Instead he was a priest,
and he had a priest's mind for he looked at me sternly.

'Alfred sent me to preach peace,' he said, 'and I have watched you murder a holy brother,
and now this.' He grimaced at the dead.

'Alfred sent us to make Guthred safe.' I reminded him.

'And we have to make certain Saint Cuthbert is safe.' he insisted.

'We will.'

'We can't stay here, Uhtred, we have to go back to Cetreht.' He looked up at me with alarm
in his one good eye. 'We have to defeat Ivarr!'

'We will, father.' I said.

'He has the biggest army in Northumbria!'

'But he will die alone, father.' I said, and I was not sure why I said that. The words just
came from my tongue, and I thought a god must have spoken through me. 'He will die alone,' I
said again, 'I promise it.'

But there were things to do first. There was Kjartan's hoard to uncover from the hall where
the dogs were kenneled, and we put Kjartan's slaves to work, digging into the shit-stinking
floor, and beneath it were barrels of silver and vats of gold and crosses from churches and
arm rings and leather bags of amber, jet and garnets, and even bolts of precious imported
silk that had half rotted away in the damp earth. Kjartan's defeated warriors made a pyre
for their dead, though Ragnar insisted that neither Kjartan nor what was left of Sven should
be given such a funeral. Instead they were stripped of their armour and their clothes and
then their naked corpses were given to those pigs which had been spared the autumn slaughter
and lived in the north-west corner of the compound.

Rollo was given charge of the fortress. Guthred, in the excitement of victory, had
announced that the fort was now his property and that it would become a royal fortress of
Northumbria, but I took him aside and told him to give it to Ragnar. 'Ragnar will be your
friend,' I told him, 'and you can trust him to hold Dunholm.' I could trust Ragnar, too, to
raid Bebbanburg's lands and to keep my treacherous uncle in fear.

So Guthred gave Dunholm to Ragnar, and Ragnar entrusted its keeping to Rollo and he
left him just thirty men to hold the walls while we went south. Over fifty of Kjartan's
defeated men swore their loyalty to Ragnar, but only after he had determined that none
of them had taken part in the hall-burning that had killed his parents. Any man who had
helped with that murder was killed. The rest would ride with us, first to Cetreht, and then to
confront Ivarr. So half our job was done. Kjartan the Cruel and Sven the One-Eyed were dead,
but Ivarr lived and Alfred of Wessex, though he had never said as much, wanted him dead
too.

So we rode south.

We left next morning. The rain had gone southwards, leaving a rinsed sky ragged with small
hurrying clouds beneath which we rode from Dunholm's high gate. We left the treasure in
Rollo's keeping. We were all wealthy men for we had taken Kjartan's fortune, and if we
survived our meeting with Ivarr then we would share those riches. I had more than replaced
the hoard I had left at Fifhaden and I would go back to Alfred as a rich man, one of the
richest in his kingdom,, and that was a cheering thought as we followed Ragnar's
eagle-wing standard towards the nearest ford across the Wiire. Brida rode with Ragnar,
Gisela was beside me and Thyra would not leave Beocca's side. I never did discover what
Ragnar had said to her in Kjartan's hall, but she was calm with him now. The madness was gone.
Her fingernails were trimmed, her hair was tidy beneath a white bonnet and that morning she
had greeted her brother with a kiss. She still looked unhappy, but Beocca had the words to
comfort her and she drew on those words as if they were water and she were dying of thirst.
They both rode mares and Beocca for once, had forgotten his discomfort in the saddle as he
talked with Thyra. I could see his good hand gesturing as he spoke. Behind him a servant led
a packhorse which carried four big altar crosses taken from Kjartan's hoard. Beocca had
demanded they be returned to the church, and none of us could deny him for he had proved
himself as great a hero as any of us, and now he leaned towards Thyra, spoke urgently, and
she listened.

'She'll be a Christian within a week,' Gisela said to me.

'Sooner,' I said.

'So what happens to her?' she asked.

I shrugged. 'He'll talk her into a nunnery, I suppose.'

'Poor woman.'

'At least she'll learn obedience there,' I said. 'She won't make twelve into
thirteen.'

Gisela punched my arm, thus hurting herself instead of me. 'I swore,' she said, rubbing
her knuckles where they had scraped against my mail, 'that once I found you again I would not
leave you. Not ever.'

'But thirteen?' I asked her. 'How could you do that?'

'Because I knew the gods were with us,' she said simply. 'I cast the runesticks.'

'And what do the runesticks say of Ivarr?' I asked.

'That he will die like a snake under a hoe.' she said grimly, then flinched as a gobbet of
mud, thrown up by a hoof of Steapa's horse, spattered onto her face. She wiped it off, then
frowned at me. 'Must we go to Wessex?'

'I swore as much to Alfred.'

'You swore?'

'I gave him my oath.'

'Then we must go to Wessex,' she said without enthusiasm. 'Do you like Wessex?'

'No.'

'Alfred?'

'No.'

'Why not?'

'He's too pious,' I said, 'and he's too earnest. And he stinks.'

'All Saxons stink.' she said.

'He stinks worse than most. It's his illness. It makes him shit all the time.'

She grimaced. 'Doesn't he wash?'

'At least once a month,' I said, 'and probably more often. He's very fastidious about
washing, but he still stinks. Do I stink?'

'Like a boar.' she said, grinning. 'Will I like Alfred?'

'No. He won't approve of you because you're not a

She laughed at that. 'What will he do with you?'

'He'll give me land,' I said, 'and expect me to fight for him.'

'Which means you'll fight the Danes?'

'The Danes are Alfred's enemies,' I said, 'so yes. I'll fight the Danes.'

'But they're my people.' she said.

'And I've given Alfred my oath,' I said, 'so I must do what he wants.' I leaned back as the
stallion picked its way down a steep hill. 'I love the Danes,' I said, 'love them far more than
I do the West Saxons, but it's my fate to fight for Wessex. Wyrd bid ful araed.'

'Which means?'

That fate is fate. That it rules us.'

She thought about that. She was dressed in her mail again, but around her neck was a golden
tore taken from Kjartan's treasures. It was made from seven strands twisted into one and I
had seen similar things dug from the graves of ancient British chieftains. It gave her a wild
look, which suited her. Her black hair was pinned under a woollen cap and she had a faraway
look on her long face, and I thought I could look at that face for ever. 'So how long must you
be Alfred's man?'

'Until he releases me,' I said, 'or until either he or I die.'

'But you say he's sick. So how long can he live?'

'Probably not very long.'

'So who becomes king then?'

'I don't know.' I said, and I wished I did. Alfred's son, Edward, was a mewling child, much
too young to rule, and his nephew, Æthelwold, from whom Alfred had usurped the throne, was a
drunken fool. The drunken fool had the better claim to the throne, and I suddenly found
myself hoping that Alfred would live long. That did surprise me. I had told Gisela the truth,
that I did not like Alfred, but I recognised that he was the true power in the island of
Britain. No one else had his vision, no one else had his determination, and Kjartan's death
was not so much our doing, but Alfred's. He had sent us north, knowing we would do what he
wanted even though he had not explicitly told us what that was, and I was struck by the
thought that life as his oath-man might not be as dull as I had feared. But if he died soon, I
thought, then that would be the end of Wessex. The thegns would fight for his crown and the
Danes would scent the weakness and come like ravens to pluck the corpse-meat.