by H A CULLEY
I was full of gratitude and promised each of her rescuers a farmstead of their own if we survived the war and defeated the Danes. They were suitably grateful, but I sensed that they thought the likelihood of Wessex driving the heathen horde out of the kingdom was remote.
We formed up to defend the baggage train but the Danes gave up the pursuit before they reached us. I learned later that we had lost over three hundred men, but our estimate of enemy dead and seriously wounded was twice that number.
The death of both the hereræswa, Pӕga, and Bishop Heahmund was a serious blow and it was with a heavy heart that we retraced our steps to the security of Wintanceaster after the monks had dealt with the wounded and loaded the more seriously injured into the wagons of the baggage train. One suggested that the Lady Leofflæd and I should travel in one of the wagons.
It was the first time I’d heard her referred to in that way but, of course, as the wife of an ealdorman he was perfectly correct. Needless to say we both refused: me politely, my wife indignantly.
We reached Wintanceaster at dusk that day, the twenty second of March. All I wanted to do was have a soak in a tub and then sleep for a year. The soak wasn’t possible because of our wounds, many of which had required stitching and bandaging, so we had to be content with a wipe down by the king’s servants. Just as we were about to go to sleep, a cheerful page arrived with a polite request that we attend the king in the main hall. I nearly threw something at the grinning boy, but then I realised that it was Ulfrid, the Lady Ealhswith’s brother.
We hadn’t seen much of Ælfred’s wife since arriving in Wintanceaster two months ago. She had been heavily pregnant then and was now recovering from giving birth to a daughter, who the royal couple had named Æthelflæd. Little did I realise at the time what a pivotal role she was to play in the history of both Wessex and Mercia.
‘Ah, Jørren, excellent. I’m sorry to drag you from a well-earned rest but the king has a vital task for your scouts,’ Ælfred said as I entered the hall.
Æthelred looked pale and wan and he winced in pain as he gestured for his brother to continue. The sweet and sickly stench of rotting flesh hung in the air and I knew that the gangrene in his wounded thigh had got much worse. His wife, Wulfthryth, fussed over him and Bishop Asser knelt in prayer by the side of the chair in which the king sat. It would need a real miracle if he was to recover.
Then I noticed the king’s two sons: Æthelhelm and Æthelwold, standing beside their distraught mother. The elder must have been eleven at the time and stared around him with a vacant look. I had heard that he was simple-minded and it looked as if the rumours were true. Æthelwold, who was two years younger than his brother, looked very much all there. He was staring venomously at his uncle and I was pretty sure that he would prove to be a problem for Ælfred when he was older.
If Ælfred was as ruthless as some kings I’d heard of, he would have disposed of both his nephews as potential challengers for the throne; either by imprisoning them well out of sight and mind, or by having them quietly killed. The fact that Ælfred treated them with compassion says much about how honourable he was.
‘I want your scouts to track the Danes and let me know where they are headed to next, and in what numbers,’ Ælfred was saying as my thoughts were dragged back to the present.
‘Very good, lord.’
‘One more thing; following the death of Pӕga, Wessex is without a hereræswa.’
I’m afraid I immediately jumped to the conclusion that I was about to be offered the prestigious appointment, but I was brought down to earth with a bump by Ælfred’s next words.
‘Whilst I value your service and good advice, the ealdormen of Wessex don’t really know you and they would never accept you in the role.’
He smiled to rob his words of any offence.
‘However, the king and I would value your advice on who you would recommend for the appointment. We would, of course, like you to remain as chief of scouts and you will naturally have a powerful voice in the Witenaġemot as the Ealdorman of Berrocscir.’
I had the feeling that Ælfred knew exactly how my mind was working and was trying to let me down gently. I thought he was wrong. My military advice to date had been sound and I knew that I had distinguished myself in battle. None of the other ealdormen who had joined the army to date had impressed me. The only one who had, Ethelwulf, my predecessor as ealdorman, was dead.
I left feeling thoroughly disgruntled to give my scouts the bad news that they would be riding out again immediately. However hard I tried not to, I knew that I would resent whoever was chosen as Pӕga’s replacement. However, that didn’t happen for some time.
The next day I went in search of the boy I’d captured at the Battle of Meretum. I asked Erik where he was and he said that the steward had taken him as a slave to work as a spit-boy. I was already feeling bad-tempered and I set off to find the steward and reclaim my property.
‘Where is my captive?’ I barked at him when I had run him to earth. ‘The Danish boy I captured at Meretum. I am told you have taken him unlawfully and put him to work as a spit boy.’
‘Oh him. He’s useless for anything else; he doesn’t speak any English and is a gormless fool.’
‘He was not yours to employ, steward. And I’m an ealdorman, you will call me lord.’
‘Yes, lord,’ he replied putting just enough emphasis on the last word to make it sound like an insult.
I knew that I was being boorish and had probably just made a new enemy, but I didn’t care. I went into the hall and found the boy, his flesh half scorched and dripping with sweat as he turned the spit on which a large boar was roasting.
‘Boy, yes you. Stop that and come with me.’
He looked startled at being addressed in his own language, although I learned later that he was in fact from Sweoland and not Danmǫrk. Then he grinned and nodded, leaving the spit and coming towards me. One of the other spit boys, recovering at the side of the hall from his own stint, swore at him and rushed to continue the rotation of the boar before it started to burn on one side.
After he had washed the sweat and dirt away, I got one of the servants to find him a clean tunic and trousers before I interrogated him. His name was Bjarne and his father had been a hearth warrior sworn to serve Jarl Fionnbharr. He had been taken along as a ship’s boy on the jarl’s own longship until he turned thirteen, when he’d been accepted as a warrior under training by Fionnbharr, largely because of the losses the jarl had sustained in Wessex. The man who had used him as bait, and then been killed after I’d knocked Bjarne out, had been his father.
Getting information out of him was like extracting a tooth from a wolf. He was surly, defiant and swore at me a lot. Erik had joined me and he cuffed the boy around the head every time he cursed me and used far worse words back at him. Danish and Swedish were different languages but it seemed they shared similar foul language.
In fact, Bjarne spoke Danish quite well, as I found out later; you had to if you were part of the heathen army as the majority of its warriors were Danes. He said he knew nothing about the state of the enemy forces until I threatened to give him back to the steward as a spit boy. After that he became more cooperative.
He told me that Ívarr the Boneless had been killed fighting to keep a throne he’d usurped in Irlond. That was good news as we were always worried that he and his army would return and join his brother, Halfdan. He also told me that seven earls had been killed in the battles fought since the beginning of the year. The term earl was new to me but I learned that, whilst jarl meant chieftain and could mean both a leader of a warband or a major landholder, the latter were increasingly being called earls to differentiate them from minor landowners and captains of warbands.
Their army was disheartened over the severe losses they’d sustained in the past few months and many wanted to quit Wessex. A few had left already. This was music to my ears, if true. However, rumours that King Æthelred was on his deathbed had encouraged them to stay so
that they could exploit the chaos they thought would follow his demise.
I went to see Ælfred and told him what Bjarne had said. However, he was sceptical and tended discount the testimony of a young Dane. Bishop Asser backed him up and maintained that heathens couldn’t be trusted. I went away feeling even more frustrated than ever.
I was impressed by young Bjarne’s spirit and decided to offer him a place with my trainee scouts if he would swear to be my man. Unlike Asser I knew that Vikings, like most Anglo-Saxons, would rather die than break an oath.
Bjarne surprised me but not swearing to be my man immediately when I offered him the choice of that or returning to be a spit boy. It showed how seriously he took giving his word. Erik explained that what bothered the lad was the fact that he’s already given his oath. Erik said that his jarl was undoubtedly dead and therefore he was free to give his fealty to a new lord, but Bjarne stubbornly maintained that there was no proof of that.
‘I’ll give you two days to decide, either you give me your oath or you go back to the steward. Erik, take him away to join the other trainees.’
I had ten boys between the ages of eleven and fourteen training to join my warband. Some were the thralls we’d rescued and others were orphans from the streets of Wintanceaster who wanted to better themselves.
Bjarne asked to see me the following day. He’d been surprised how easily the other boys had accepted him and were even willing to teach him English. He had evidently overcome his scruples and he gave me his oath. In due course he proved to be one of my most courageous warriors. Erik was happy too. He’d been missing Ulf and Tove but now he had a fellow Viking to share experiences with. The two became fast friends, despite their age difference.
Ϯϯϯ
It took a month for my wounds, and those of Leofflæd, to heal sufficiently for us to ride without fear of tearing the stiches and re-opening the various wounds we’d suffered. We found this extremely frustrating as both of us were eager to go and visit our vills at Silcestre and Basingestoches.
Of course, we received regular reports from the reeves. The inhabitants had returned and life was gradually getting back to normal. The land had been tilled and new crops had been sown. On the down side my scouts reported that the Vikings had returned to Readingum. Thankfully they seemed to have stopped raiding further into Wessex and their attention now turned to southern Mercia. No doubt the fact that King Burghred seemed loathe to oppose them made Mercia a more attractive prospect than Wessex, where they had suffered grievous casualties for little reward.
King Æthelred’s health continued to decline and, despite the successful amputation of his gangrenous leg, everyone knew that he was not destined to live for much longer. We left in early April to visit my two vills in Hamtunscīr before travelling on to some of the various vills I now owned as Ealdorman of Berrocscir. The ealdorman’s hall was at Readingum and many of my dozen vills in the shire were located between there and Eatun further to the east along the Temes. They were lost to me pro tem so I decided to base myself at Ferendone at the western end of my shire for the time being.
Ferendone proved to be a vill of a similar size to Silcestre. There was a hall, a small timber church and a dozen or so huts. It was surrounded by five farmsteads, all of which were now owned by me and each had a tenant. It was a pleasant place in the wide valley that runs from Oxenaforda in Mercia to Suindune in Wiltunscir. It had rich soil and was a prosperous settlement, as yet untouched by war. The reeve seemed honest enough, although the priest was uneducated and had a wife and a brood of small children. The latter didn’t bother me, there were plenty of married priests, although the more devout held that clerics should be celibate. It was the fact that he couldn’t read and barely knew anything of the Bible that concerned me. I would talk to Bishop Asser about him when there were less pressing matters to concern us.
The day after our arrival at Ferendone a messenger arrived to say that King Æthelred had died on the twenty third of April and that a witenaġemot had been called at Winburne for the twenty-ninth of the month, the day after the funeral. I wondered why Æthelred was being buried at Winburne instead of at Wintanceaster, but apparently it was specified in his will. All ealdormen and king’s thegns of Wessex, including the sub-kingdoms of Ēast Seaxna Rīce, Cent and Suth-Seaxe, had been summoned, although it was unlikely that more than half would be able to attend in these troubled times.
I left Leofflæd to oversee certain improvements I wanted at Ferendone, especially the construction of a larger, stone built hall and a palisade, and set of for Winburne with an escort of eight men and boys. The rest of my warriors were split between the various vills I owned to train the fyrd and to select boys who would join my warband when they were ready.
I had foolishly assumed that the route between Ferendone and Winburne was safe. Nevertheless I had put out Erik and Bjarne as scouts. It would take at least two days to get there and so I decided to stay for the night at Basingestoches and then travel to Winburne via Wintanceaster the next day. We had just travelled through a large wooded area and were about to emerge into open country three miles short of Basingestoches when the two scouts came galloping back.
‘There are Danes attacking your vill, lord,’ Erik said breathlessly.
‘How many?’
‘Perhaps fifty, lord, but our warriors and the fyrd are making a fight of it.’
I had left five of my warriors at Basingestoches and the ceorls of fighting age numbered something over sixty. They slightly outnumbered the heathens but they might have been caught unawares and, despite their training recently, a farmer was no match for an experienced Viking warrior.
When we arrived my men were making a stand in the centre of the settlement whilst the women and children fled towards the woods. When they saw my eight men and me appear, they stopped and cheered. I gestured exasperatedly for them to continue to flee; there was no guarantee as to the outcome after all.
We dismounted at the outskirts and, leaving Bjarne to hold the horses, I signalled for my men to climb up onto the rooftops at the rear of where the fighting was occurring. I glanced around from my vantage point and saw several dead women, children and the odd male slave and villein in the streets around the central square. Men on both sides who had died in the fighting lay in groups where they’d fallen. I muttered curses at the Danes below us and we commenced sending arrow after arrow into the rear of their shield wall.
The result was utter confusion in their ranks and men started to fall with arrows in the necks, backs and legs. They had suffered ten casualties before the rear rank managed to turn around and use their shields to protect themselves. It was too dangerous to shoot over the rear rank because of the risk of hitting our own men. Instead we left our bows and climbed down to the ground.
I swung my shield, which was on my back, around and grabbed hold of a new weapon I’d devised recently. It was a mace; a short, thick wooden stock with a heavy ball of iron at the end. The blacksmith who had made it to my design had affixed thin, cone-shaped points to the ball. They were long enough to punch through the metal of a helmet and the leather arming cap underneath before driving into the victim’s brain, killing him instantly. That was the theory at any rate and I’d been itching to try it out; now was my chance.
We formed a small shield wall with two men on each side of me and four behind. We banged shields with the warriors facing us and I swung my heavy mace overhand to crush the helmet of the man opposite me. I felt a jar as mace and head collided and he dropped from sight without a sound. I grunted in satisfaction and repeated the move with the man behind him.
My companions were still battling with the Danish shield wall but I had moved slightly ahead of them. Now the backs of those fighting the men of Basingestoches faced me. I swung my mace again and another Dane died. However, I had been foolish. I was protected to my front by my shield but my flanks were exposed. I felt an inexpertly wielded spear glance off the side of my byrnie and then an axeman on my left raised his weapon ab
ove his head to chop me down.
I thrust the point on the top of the mace into the eye of the spearman but I knew I was going to die at the hands of the axeman. Then one of my men appeared at my side. He thrust his dagger upwards under the axeman’s byrnie and into his groin. The eyes under the rim of my attacker’s helmet registered surprise, then agony. A second later I sideswiped my mace into his face, crushing his cheekbone and his jaw.
I stepped back and glanced to my right to nod my thanks to my saviour only to see that it was Bjarne, who I’d left with the horses. I was speechless with amazement. Rescuing the lad from life as a spit boy had saved my life.
The Danes had had enough. They had lost half their number, and for nothing. They ran and my victorious men ran after them. The ceorls of the fyrd weren’t slowed down by the weight of chain mail and they were intent on vengeance. Six more Danes were killed by them and then my warriors and I - now mounted once more - overtook the remainder. Some turned to fight and that delayed us. By the time we’d disposed of them the remaining few had reached the trees and we let them go.
I gave the crushed helmets to the blacksmith to melt down and reuse the metal but we collected the byrnies, good helmets and the Danish weapons for the fyrd to make good use of. The dead Vikings, and there were none alive after the women had returned and cut the throats of the wounded with relish, yielded a small fortune in coins, hack silver, gold jewellery such as cloak broaches and arm rings. I kept my share, distributed half of the rest to my warband and gave the other half to the reeve to look after the widows and orphans.
Apart from the odd flesh wound my escort were unharmed. I took one of the Viking shields and the shortest of the swords and presented it to Bjarne together with a small silver arm ring. I was rewarded by an incredulous smile and then the boy’s face grew serious.