He moved off to his right, toward the makeshift wall, his eyes on the fight in front of him. His men were racing into battle in no real order, but they had complete surprise on their side, and Cynewise’s men had no time to prepare to meet them. The best they could do was turn and face the on-rush, weapons raised.
Who commands you? Leofric wondered. Certainly not Cynewise. Clever and wily as she was, he doubted she had the mettle to lead men in battle. Indeed, she was probably too clever to even try, to risk her life in that way.
So one of the thegns who followed her. Aegenwulf, maybe. He was the most powerful of those who took Cynewise’s side. Or Eadwold, captain of her hearth-guard, perhaps. Whoever it was, Leofric figured he’d learn soon enough, once the fighting was done and they found his body, broken and bleeding on the field of battle.
He might already be dead. There were bodies enough even now. Leofric stepped carefully over and around them, backing toward the wall, figuring he would find Nothwulf somewhere near the center of the line.
And he was right. Nothwulf was in the middle of the fighting. His face was red and sweating from exertion and his shield was half shattered, but beyond that he looked whole. He also looked confused and relieved.
“Nothwulf!” Leofric shouted. He hurried on, eyes moving between Nothwulf and the battle in front of them. “Nothwulf!” Nothwulf looked his way. A smile spread over his face and he opened his mouth and shouted in exhilaration.
“Leofric! Dear Leofric!” he called and held his arms out, sword in one hand, shield in the other. Leofric met him and they embraced, then pushed apart again.
“Leofric, you’re just in time, I must say!” Nothwulf shouted. “Cynewise’s men didn’t hesitate in their attack. Aegenwulf was leading them, I’m quite sure. They came on like a pack of wolves. I thought we were done for!”
“We came as fast as we could,” Leofric said. “Thorgrim… he’s the leader of the Northmen… he did just as promised.”
“Seems to have played out how you thought!” Nothwulf said and pointed with his sword toward the battle. Leofric’s men, along with Nothwulf’s who had found new life in the sudden assistance, were pushing Cynewise’s men back, encircling them. It was clear to Leofric that their enemy, seeing the trap close around them, would break and run at any moment.
“Excellent!” Leofric said. “And you were able to get the channel free of the wrecks? I suspect Thorgrim and his lot are out to sea already.”
“No,” Nothwulf said. “The wrecks remain.”
“What? Were you not able to move them?”
“We didn’t try,” Nothwulf said. “The Northmen still have the plunder and the danegeld and I want it back. We have our army together now, and soon there’ll be no threat from Cynewise. Nothing to stop us beating the Northmen as well!”
“But…I gave my word to Thorgrim that the channel would be clear,” Leofric said.
Nothwulf shook his head. “Giving word to a Northman means nothing. There’s no honor among those lying animals. I didn’t think you really meant it. No call for us to keep our word.”
Leofric’s mouth hung open, but he said nothing. He did not know what to say. And the only thought that came into his head was, Oh, you stupid little bastard…
Chapter Thirty-Three
How the injustice assails me—my lord's absence!
Elsewhere on earth lovers share the same bed
while I pass through life, half dead…
The Wife’s Lament
10th Century English Poem
Thorgrim watched the last of the Englishmen climb over the sheer strake of his ship and of the other ships as well, and he thought, Glad to be shed of those bastards. Leofric seemed a decent one, a warrior, a man of honor. He liked Leofric, or at least felt that he could have come to like him. The same might be true of other men in Engla-land. But he did not intend to remain long enough in that country to find out.
“Rowers! Backwater!” he shouted and the rowers leaned back, then dropped their oars and pushed them away as they leaned forward. Sea Hammer slid back off of the sand, though not far enough to dislodge the bow. They went through the motion once more and Thorgrim felt the bow come free.
Another pull and Sea Hammer was turned bow first in the channel. Beyond that, Thorgrim was looking at a stretch of water half a mile long, hemmed in on either side by low shores of sand and scrubby brush. And beyond that, the sea, the glorious open sea.
“Pull!” he shouted and Sea Hammer shot forward, driven by the combined force of the oars and the ebbing tide. He pulled the tiller toward him and swung the ship toward mid-channel to give the other longships room to make their own way off the bank.
The sound of the fighting was loud and distinct, but Thorgrim could not see the actual battle, which was taking place on the other side of the makeshift wall, the wall from which the English had showered them with flaming arrows. He shook his head at the strangeness of it all. His life, he thought, was like a ship at sea, with so many forces working on it in so many ways, pushing in divergent directions, and him struggling to keep it on course. Trying to keep it afloat.
He looked astern. The other ships were underway now. Blood Hawk was in his wake, and Oak Heart and Black Wing were astern of Blood Hawk, rowing abreast, and the rest falling in behind. Six ships, each fighting the current to position themselves in the channel.
Thorgrim looked ahead again and gave the tiller a small pull. Sea Hammer’s speed was still building as the ebbing tide drove her along. Ahead and to starboard he could see the charred remains of Long Serpent’s stem and sternpost, like two black claws reaching up from below, markers for Jorund’s final resting place. He pulled the tiller a bit more, directing Sea Hammer ship to give the wreck a wide berth. He pulled his eyes from that eerie sight and looked out over the open water ahead.
He was thinking of the brutal fight that had taken place there just a few days before, and how placid the water looked now, when Sea Hammer slammed into the sunken ship still there, still hidden just below the surface. She hit with far more force than she had the first time and Thorgrim was launched forward, knocking the tiller aside as he tumbled off the afterdeck and down onto the deck below. He felt the wound in his leg tear open as he came to rest on his side and he howled in pain.
“Bastards! You bastards!” he shouted in rage and in agony. He put his hands down on the deck and began to push himself up when the ship shuddered again. The air was filled with the sound of shattering wood and shouting men and he knew that Blood Hawk, unable to check her forward way in time, had slammed into them. The impact tossed him to the deck once more. He felt the warm blood running down his leg.
His men were running and shouting. He heard Harald yelling, “Fend off, there! Fend them off!” Thorgrim grit his teeth and began to push himself up once again. He braced for the next ship to hit and to toss him down again, but this time he managed to regain his feet.
He had one hand on the sheer strake when Oak Heart hit Blood Hawk and drove her into Sea Hammer’s stern with renewed force. The three ships began to pivot sideways, pushed by the tide. They swung through ninety degrees until Sea Hammer was broadside in the channel, hung up on the wrecks below. Blood Hawk hit the charred sternpost of Long Serpent, snapped it off and continued to swing into the wrecks. Beyond that, Oak Heart also hung up on the ships hidden under the water.
The three ships came to rest, but the disaster was not over, not at all. Black Wing, which had been abreast of Oak Heart, struck Blood Hawk bow-on, driving into her larboard side like a spear hefted by a powerful man. Thorgrim could hear the crushing sound as she struck. He saw a section of her side cave in and he hoped the damage would not go clear to the waterline, or below.
Fox and Dragon were still underway, but would not be for long. Their oars were flailing as they tried to backwater, to keep themselves off the tangle of ships and gain enough room that they could turn and get their bows into the current. If they could, they might be able to tow the others free. Thorgrim wat
ched the effort. The ships’ captains, Hardbein and Fostolf, were doing exactly the right thing. But it would not work.
“Good try,” Thorgrim said to himself as he saw Fox pushed sideways in the stream and begin drifting down on Sea Hammer. Fostolf, in command of Dragon, put his tiller over in hope that he had room enough to turn. But he didn’t—Thorgrim could see that—and he guessed Fostolf could see it too, but it was worth the effort, just in case. The ship turned sideways in the channel and before they could turn any further they came hard up against Black Wing.
And there they were. Six longships, piled up against the shipwrecks below, like so much sea wrack on a beach, held there by the powerful current of the ebbing tide. A great tangle of oars, half of them sheared off, the shattered remains of shields still mounted on the shield racks, and hulls broken like eggshells. Men were shouting and wood was grinding and cracking, and beneath it all, the sounds of a battle that was raging, unseen behind the wall on shore.
Thorgrim stepped up onto the afterdeck where he could get a slightly better view of the scene. He stepped up with his right leg, dragging his left behind him, and this time, having been able to brace for the pain, he was able to resist shouting in agony.
Sea Hammer lay starboard side to the wall of sunken ships, her bow pointing toward the shore where they had left Leofric and the others. Blood Hawk was astern and the rest in a jumble beyond her. Men were shouting and using oar shafts as levers to try and force the ships apart. It was chaos and it was pointless and it had to stop.
“Hold up! Hold up!” Thorgrim shouted, reaching down deep to put all the force and volume he could into his voice. “Hold up!”
His words pierced the noise of ships and men. The various crews fell silent, and those who could see him turned and looked in his direction.
“Are any of you sinking?” he called next. There was silence. Only the sound of water piling up against the sides of the ships was audible, that and the noise of battle, which seemed to be dropping away. Then Godi, commander of Blood Hawk, called back in a voice that even Thorgrim could not hope to match.
“We’re stove in pretty bad,” he called. Black Wing’s bow was still jammed into his ship’s side. “But we won’t sink. At least not unless the seas get up.”
“Get Black Wing free and lash her alongside!” Thorgrim shouted.
From behind Thorgrim heard Failend say, “You’re bleeding a river.” He turned back. She was at the edge of the after deck, strips of cloth in her hand. She nodded at Thorgrim’s feet. He looked down. His left shoe was planting in the middle of a pool of blood.
“Just bind it up,” he said, voice like a growl. He was too furious now to care about his leg or to feel any gratitude for Failend’s concern. Nor did Failend sound as if she was offering him help from any sense of love or compassion, but rather for some unspoken obligation she seemed to feel.
She hopped up on the afterdeck, kneeled and began wrapping the cloth around his leg. “Tight, tight,” he said. He wanted the blood held inside long enough for him to kill anyone he needed to kill, and he numbered those in the dozens. Failend pulled the bandages tight. He could see the strain in her neck as she pulled, as if she was trying to hurt him. As if when she looked at his leg she saw his neck.
“Father…” Harald was standing beside him now. Thorgrim could see on Harald’s face that the boy was reading his mood correctly, and was approaching him now with great reluctance.
“Father, there’s no one on the shore over there.” He pointed astern, toward the eastern side of the channel where Leofric’s men had been. “We can shift the ships closer there, so they can’t reach us with their arrows. Then when the tide is out…”
“No.” Thorgrim cut him off. “We’ll shift Sea Hammer that way, get her bow ashore.” He pointed to the other side of the channel, the side from which the sounds of fighting could still be heard. “Then we’ll get the other ships astern, each overlapping. We’ll make a bridge so we can all get ashore there. Then we’ll kill every one of those lying, miserable whore-son English dogs.”
Cynewise sat on her horse several hundred feet behind the battlefield and watched the fighting as it unfolded. She was wearing her mail shirt and her sword, her helmet on her head. The armor her father had mocked. She smiled, just a bit.
Not so funny now, is it, you old bastard? she thought.
But for all that, she did feel a bit self-conscious wearing it. She was smarter than Nothwulf, of that she was certain, and more dangerous by far. More able to bend men to her will. Certainly more able to lead Dorset and see it rise to its proper place in the kingdom of Wessex. But she was not a warrior. And meaningless as that was, she knew it meant something to the thegns. So, to the extent that she could, she knew she had to at least appear as such.
Whatever good was happening on the battlefield was none of her doing. It was Aegenwulf’s. Aegenwulf was the most powerful of the thegns, at least those who sided with her, and he was a campaigner of old, veteran of many battles. He had fought Englishmen and Welshmen and Northmen. She had consulted with him in private, and when he had told her how best to approach the fight she had explained those plans to the rest. As far as she could tell, the fight was going as it was supposed to go.
Standing around her in a loose circle were six others, men on horseback. Five were members of her hearth-guard, there for her protection, under the command of Eadwold, who was at her right-hand side. The other was Oswin, the shire reeve, to her left. Her servant, Horsa, stood on the ground by her horse’s head.
“Eadwold, what do you make of the fight thus far?” she asked. She tried to sound as if she had her own opinion of what was going on, but in truth she didn’t. All she could see was a great swirl of men and weapons. The clash and the shouting drifted back from the battle. She could not tell who was winning, or even who was who.
“It goes well, m’lady,” Eadwold said. “It seems, as Oswin said, that but half of Nothwulf’s men were on this side of the channel. See how Aegenwulf outnumbers them and presses in on three sides.”
Cynewise did not see that, and the mention of Oswin irritated her. She was trying to put him out of her mind, even though he was sitting his horse just a few feet away. She blamed a good part of her recent troubles on his incompetence. Worse, she was having doubts about his loyalty. It would be a problem if any man under her command was disloyal, but Oswin in particular knew a great deal. He certainly could not be allowed to just run amuck.
She pulled herself back to the issue before her. “Certainly, yes, I see how Aegenwulf is attacking just as I instructed him to do.” Oswin made a short sound, like a stifled cough, infuriating but not blatantly insubordinate enough for Cynewise to turn on him.
“You think this will end soon?” she asked.
“I think, ma’am…” Oswin said but she cut him off.
“I was speaking with Eadwold,” she said. “Eadwold?”
“I would think so,” Eadwold said. “Nothwulf, he was a fool, he got the men’s backs against that wall there and now Aegenwulf’s pressing in on him and there’s nowhere to…”
Now it was Oswin who cut them off. “Dear God,” he said with genuine astonishment.
Eadwold and Cynewise had been looking at each other, but with Oswin’s exclamation they both turned back to the fight. As far as Cynewise could see, nothing had changed. Hundreds of men running about, wielding weapons, some lying on the ground, dead or wounded, she supposed.
But whatever Oswin had seen, Eadwold saw it too. “What…?” he said, his tone shocked and incredulous.
“What?” Cynewise asked. “What is it?”
“More men-at-arms, Lady Cynewise,” Oswin said. “Coming around the wall, do you see? They are on Aegenwulf’s flanks. This is not a good thing.”
Cynewise turned to Eadwold and glared at him.
“I don’t know where they came from, m’lady,” he stammered as if this were his fault, which was indeed the impression Cynewise was giving him. “Hiding on the other side of th
e wall? Held in reserve for this moment?”
Cynewise turned the other way and glared at Oswin, but Oswin did not meet her eye. “I thought you said Leofric’s men, half of Nothwulf’s army, were stuck on the far side of the channel. Where did these men come from?”
Oswin shrugged. “I can’t imagine,” he said. “Maybe Leofric found some way to get them across. He didn’t have boats enough that I knew of. Maybe the Northmen are helping him.”
Cynewise felt suddenly ill. With Leofric’s men on the other side of the channel, her army had been twice the size of Nothwulf’s. Even with Leofric’s men there, and with her father’s men gone, she still had as many men-at-arms as Nothwulf. But if the heathens had thrown in with Nothwulf…
“Still, we were beating Nothwulf and we are beating him still,” Cynewise announced. Eadwold made a sound in his throat that might have been construed as a reply, though not an answer of any sort. Oswin, however, made a genuine reply.
“Oh, I think not, Lady Cynewise,” he said. “These new men are fresh, and they’ve taken Aegenwulf quite by surprise. See, now they’re pressing in on him. I fear the worst, ma’am.”
“You sound pretty damned smug for someone who fears the worst,” Cynewise snapped.
Oswin finally took his eyes from the fight and turned to her. “Forgive me, ma’am,” he said. “I’m only telling you the truth. If my tone doesn’t suggest the terror I feel for you, I apologize.”
Cynewise turned back to the battle, teeth clenched, and she knew her face was red and that made her angrier still. The fighting seemed to be getting closer. Before, Aegenwulf had been pushing Nothwulf’s men back, but now it seemed to be the other way around. Her anger at Oswin filled her mind, but she reminded herself that if Aegenwulf was defeated on the field of battle then she had bigger problems by far than his impudence.
The mounted band was silent after that, watching the battle unfold. From the few things that Oswin and Eadwold had said Cynewise had a better idea of what was happening, and she thought she was making sense of it.
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