The Lords of the North (8 page)

linen. A gilt-bronze circlet served as his crown. 'Beloved Saint Oswald,'

Eadred said, making the sign of the cross, 'protect us and guide us and pray for us.' The
king's lips had shrivelled so that three of his teeth showed. They were like yellow pegs. The
monks kneeling closest to Oswald bobbed up and down in silent and fervent prayer. 'Saint
Oswald,' Eadred announced, 'is a warrior of God and with him on our side none can stand
against us.'

He stepped past the dead king's head to the last and biggest of the chests. The church was
silent. The Christians, of course, were aware that by revealing the relics, Eadred was
summoning the powers of heaven to witness the oaths, while the pagan Danes, even if they
did not understand exactly what was happening, were awed by the magic they sensed in the
big building. And they sensed that more and greater magic was about to happen, for the monks
now prostrated themselves flat on the earthen floor as Eadred silently prayed beside the
last box. He prayed for a long time, his hands clasped, his lips moving and with his eyes raised
to the rafters where sparrows fluttered and then at last he unlatched the chest's two heavy
bronze locks and lifted the big lid.

A corpse lay inside the big chest. The corpse was wrapped in a linen cloth, but I could see
the body's shape clearly enough. Guthred had again taken my arm as if I could protect him
against Eadred's sorcery. Eadred, meanwhile, gently unwrapped the linen and so revealed a
dead bishop robed in white and with his face covered by a small white square of cloth that was
hemmed with golden thread. The corpse had an embroidered scapular about its neck and a
battered mitre had fallen from its head. A cross of gold, decorated with garnets, lay
half-hidden by his hands that were prayerfully clasped on his breast. A ruby ring shone on
one shrunken finger. Some of the monks were gasping, as though they could not endure the holy
power flowing from the corpse and even Eadred was subdued. He touched his forehead against
the edge of the coffin, then straightened to look at me. 'You know who this is?' he asked.

'No.'

'In the name of the Father,' he said, 'and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,'

and he took the square of golden-hemmed linen away to reveal a yellowed face blotched with
darker patches. 'It is Saint Cuthbert.' Eadred said with a tearful catch in his voice. 'It is
the most blessed, the most holy, the most beloved Cuthbert. Oh dear sweet God,' he rocked
backward and forward on his knees, 'this is Saint Cuthbert himself.'

Until the age of ten I had been raised on stories of Cuthbert. I learned how he had trained
a choir of seals to sing psalms, and how the eagles had brought food to the small island off
Bebbanburg where he lived in solitude for a time. He could calm storms by prayer and had
rescued countless sailors from drowning. Angels came to talk with him. He had once rescued a
family by commanding the flames that consumed their house to return to hell, and the fire
had miraculously vanished. He would walk into the winter sea until the cold water reached
his neck and he would stay there all night, praying, and when he came back to the beach in the
dawn his monk's robes would be dry. He drew water from parched ground during a drought and when
birds stole newly-sewn barley seed he commanded them to return it, which they did. Or so I
was told. He was certainly the greatest saint of Northumbria, the holy man who watched over
us and to whom we were supposed to direct our prayers so that he could whisper them into the
ear of God, and here he was in a carved and gilded elm box, flat on his back, nostrils gaping,
mouth slightly open, cheeks fallen in, and with five yellow-black teeth from which the gums
had receded so they looked like fangs. One fang was broken. His eyes were shut. My
stepmother had possessed Saint Cuthbert's comb and she had liked to tell me that she had
found some of the saint's hair on the comb's teeth and that the hair had been the colour of
finest gold, but this corpse had hair black as pitch. It was long, lank and brushed away from a
high forehead and from his monkish tonsure. Eadred gently restored the mitre, then leaned
forward and kissed the ruby ring. 'You will note,' he said in a voice made hoarse by emotion,
'that the holy flesh is uncorrupted,' he paused to stroke one of the saint's bony hands,

'and that miracle is a sure and certain sign of his sanctity.' He leaned forward and this
time kissed the saint full on the open, shrivelled lips. 'Oh most holy Cuthbert,' he prayed
aloud, 'guide us and lead us and bring us to your glory in the name of Him who died for us and
upon whose right hand you now sit in splendour everlasting, amen.'

'Amen,' the monks chimed. The closest monks had got up from the floor so they could see the
uncorrupted saint and most of them cried as they gazed at the yellowing face.

Eadred looked up at me again. 'In this church, young man,' he said, 'is the spiritual soul
of Northumbria. Here, in these chests, are our miracles, our treasures, our glory, and the
means by which we speak with God to seek his protection. While these precious and holy things
are safe, we are safe, and once,' he stood as he said that last word and his voice grew much
harder,

'once all these things were under the protection of the lords of Bebbanburg, but that
protection failed! The pagans came, the monks were slaughtered, and the men of Bebbanburg
cowered behind their walls rather than ride to slaughter the pagans. But our forefathers in
Christ saved these things, and we have wandered ever since, wandered across the wild lands,
and we keep these things still, but one day we shall make a great church and these relics will
shine forth across a holy land. That holy land is where I lead these people!' He waved his hand
to indicate the folk waiting outside the church. 'God has sent me an army,' he shouted, 'and
that army will triumph, but I am not the man to lead it. God and Saint Cuthbert sent me a dream
in which they showed me the king who will take us all to our promised land. He showed me King
Guthred!' He stood and raised Guthred's arm aloft and the gesture provoked applause from the
congregation. Guthred looked surprised rather than regal, and I just looked down at the dead
saint.

Cuthbert had been the abbot and bishop of Lindisfarena, the island that lay just north
of Bebbanburg, and for almost two hundred years his body had lain in a crypt on the island
until the Viking raids became too threatening and, to save the saintly corpse, the monks had
taken the dead man inland. They had been wandering Northumbria ever since. Eadred disliked
me because my family had failed to protect the holy relics, but the strength of Bebbanburg
was its position on the sea-lashed crag, and only a fool would take its garrison beyond
the walls to fight. If I had a choice between keeping Bebbanburg and abandoning a relic,
then I would have surrendered the whole calendar of dead saints. Holy corpses are cheap, but
fortresses like Bebbanburg are rare.

'Behold!' Eadred shouted, still holding Guthred's arm aloft, 'the king of
Haliwerfolkland!'

The king of what? I thought I had misheard, but I had not. Haliwerfolkland, Eadred had
said, and it meant the Land of the Holy Man People. That was Eadred's name for Guthred's
kingdom. Saint Cuthbert, of course, was the holy man, but whoever was king of his land would
be a sheep among wolves. Ivarr, Kjartan and my uncle were the wolves. They were the men who led
proper forces of trained soldiers, while Eadred was hoping to make a kingdom on the back of a
dream, and I had no doubts that his dream-born sheep would end up being savaged by the wolves.
Still, for the moment, Cair Ligualid was my best refuge in Northumbria, because my enemies
would need to cross the hills to find me and, besides, I had a taste for this kind of madness.
In madness lies change, in change is opportunity and in opportunity are riches.

'Now,' Eadred let go of Guthred's hand and turned on me, 'you will swear fealty to our king
and his country.'

Guthred actually winked at me then, and I obediently went on my knees and reached for
his right hand, but Eadred knocked my hands away. 'You swear to the saint.' he hissed at me.

'To the saint?'

'Place your hands on Saint Cuthbert's most holy hands,' Eadred ordered me,

'and say the words.'

I put my hands over Saint Cuthbert's fingers and I could feel the big ruby ring under my
own fingers, and I gave the jewel a twitch just to see whether the stone was loose and would
come free, but it seemed well fixed in its setting. 'I swear to be your man,' I said to the
corpse, 'and to serve you faithfully.' I tried to shift the ring again, but the dead fingers
were stiff and the ruby would not move.

'You swear by your life?' Eadred asked sternly.

I gave the ring another twitch, but it really was immovable. 'I swear on my life.' I
said respectfully and never, in all that life, have I taken an oath so lightly. How can an
oath to a dead man be binding?

'And you swear to serve King Guthred faithfully?'

'I do,' I said.

'And to be an enemy to all his enemies?'

'I swear it,' I said.

'And you will serve Saint Cuthbert even to the end of your life?'

'I will.'

'Then you may kiss the most blessed Cuthbert.' Eadred said. I leaned over the coffin's edge
to kiss the folded hands. 'No!' Eadred protested. 'On the lips!'

I shuffled on my knees, then bent and kissed the corpse on its dry, scratchy lips.

'Praise God.' Eadred said. Then he made Guthred swear to serve Cuthbert and the church
watched as the slave king knelt and kissed the corpse. The monks sang as the folk in the church
were allowed to see Cuthbert for themselves. Hild shuddered when she came to the coffin and
she fell to her knees, tears streaming down her face, and I had to lift her up and lead her
away. Willibald was similarly overcome, but his face just glowed with happiness. Gisela, I
noticed, did not bow to the corpse. She looked at it with curiosity, but it was plain it meant
nothing to her and I deduced she was a pagan still. She stared at the dead man, then looked at
me and smiled. Her eyes, I thought, were brighter than the ruby on the dead saint's finger. And
so Guthred came to Cair Ligualid. I thought then, and still think now, that it was all nonsense,
but it was a magical nonsense, and the dead swordsman had made himself liege to a dead man
and the slave had become a king. The gods were laughing.

Later, much later, I realised I was doing what Alfred would have wanted me to do. I was
helping the Christians. There were two wars in those years. The obvious struggle was
between Saxon and Dane, but there was also combat between pagans and Christians. Most
Danes were pagan and most Saxons were Christian, so the two wars appeared to be the same
fight, but in Northumbria it all became confused, and that was Abbot Eadred's cleverness.
What Eadred did was to end the war between the Saxons and the Danes in Cumbraland, and he did
it by choosing Guthred. Guthred, of course, was a Dane and that meant Cumbraland's Danes were
ready to follow him and, because he had been proclaimed king by a Saxon abbot, the Saxons
were equally prepared to support him. Thus the two biggest warring tribes of Cumbraland,
the Danes and Saxons, were united, while the Britons, and a good many Britons still lived in
Cumbraland, were also Christians and their priests told them to accept Eadred's choice and
so they did.

It is one thing to proclaim a king and another for the king to rule, but Eadred had made a
shrewd choice. Guthred was a good man, but he was also the son of Hardicnut who had called
himself king of Northumbria, so Guthred had a claim to the crown, and none of Cumbraland's
thegns was strong enough to challenge him. They needed a king because, for too long, they had
squabbled among themselves and suffered from the Norse raids out of Ireland and from the
savage incursions from Strath Clota. Guthred, by uniting Dane and Saxon, could now marshal
stronger forces to face those enemies. There was one man who might have been a rival. Ulf, he
was called, and he was a Dane who owned land south of Cair Ligualid and he had greater wealth
than any other thegn in Cumbraland, but he was old and lame and without sons and so he
offered fealty to Guthred, and Ulf's example persuaded the other Danes to accept Eadred's
choice. They knelt to him one by one and he greeted them by name, raised them and embraced
them.

'I really should become a Christian.' he told me on the morning after our arrival.

'Why?'

'I told you why. To show gratitude. Aren't you supposed to call me lord?'

'Yes, lord.'

'Does it hurt?'

'Calling you lord, lord?'

'No!' he laughed. 'Becoming a Christian?'

'Why should it hurt?'

'I don't know. Don't they nail you to a cross?'

'Of course they don't,' I said scornfully, 'they just wash you.'

'I wash myself anyway,' he said, then frowned. 'Why do Saxons not wash? Not you, you wash,
but most Saxons don't. Not as much as Danes. Do they like being dirty?'

'You can catch cold by washing.'

'I don't,' he said. 'So that's it? A wash?'

'Baptism, it's called.'

'And you have to give up the other gods?'

'You're supposed to.'

'And only have one wife?'

'Only one wife. They're strict about that.'

He thought about it. 'I still think I should do it,' he said, 'because Eadred's god does have
power. Look at that dead man! It's a miracle that he hasn't rotted away!'

The Danes were fascinated by Eadred's relics. Most did not understand why a group of
monks would carry a corpse, a dead king's head and a jewelled book all over Northumbria, but
they did understand that those things were sacred and they were impressed by that. Sacred
things have power. They are a pathway from our world to the vaster worlds beyond, and even
before Guthred arrived in Cair Ligualid some Danes had accepted baptism as a way of
harnessing the power of the relics for themselves.