“How?”
“The Thames marks the border between Mercia and Wessex. I want you to take your Hel-hides, cross the river, and raid the towns and villages there as you drive south into Ælfred’s kingdom.”
Geirmund sipped his ale. “That will surely draw their gaze.”
“You must be quick, and you must strike hard for five days. Ælfred must believe you are more than a single war-band.”
“Our tally will be small against Ælfred’s army. If he should catch us–”
“He will not catch you.” The king reached out and gripped Geirmund’s shoulder. “He must not catch you. I ask this of you because I know you alone have the needed cunning.”
Geirmund paused to consider what Guthrum wanted of him. To follow the king’s order would mean marching his Hel-hides deep into enemy lands, without friends or defences to which they could fall back, and rather than hide from the Saxons, Geirmund was to draw Ælfred’s full wrath down upon himself and his warriors. Death seemed certain, and he knew that fate, not cunning, would decide the outcome of such a task, though speed might help them.
“Each of my warriors must have a horse,” Geirmund said. “Some of them will need new weapons and armour.”
The king nodded. “You will have whatever you need.”
“And you will pay ten pounds of silver to every warrior who returns.”
Guthrum’s eyes opened wide. “What? Are you–”
“That is, ten pounds on top of the silver they are owed already.”
The king laughed in disbelief. “That is many times the weight I would pay–”
“They will be facing many times the danger, and they are giving you Wessex. Each Hel-hide who returns from this should have wealth enough to buy land and livestock, if they wish it.” Before the king could argue, Geirmund said, “This is not greed, my king. We will not have time to plunder. If you need my warriors to accomplish this, then I must give them a reason to accomplish it. The matter before you, then, is how badly you need this.”
The king scowled, and Geirmund took a drink of his ale, waiting.
“What about you?” Guthrum finally asked. “What do you want for yourself?”
“To be a jarl in Wessex,” Geirmund said.
A moment passed, and then the king nodded. “Ready them quickly. Ten pounds to each who returns.”
Geirmund bowed his head and left the king’s hall. When he returned to his Hel-hides, he chose to tell them first about the silver, which seemed to stir and heat them like a hot stone dropped in the pot.
“Óðinn’s eye, ten pounds?” Rafn turned to his pale companion. “A warrior could stop raiding and settle with that.”
“What does he want from us?” Vetr asked. “I doubt the king is simply being generous.”
Geirmund inhaled and explained the task that Guthrum had allotted them, after which his warriors cooled, falling silent and still.
“Now I understand,” Birna said. “Guthrum doesn’t plan for any of us to return.”
“It doesn’t matter what the king plans,” Geirmund said. “If it is our fate to return, we will return. All of us.”
“Then let us empty the bastard’s hoard,” Steinólfur said. “When do we leave?”
“Soon.” Geirmund looked across the faces of his warriors. His company still had a tally of forty-two, but many were in need of gear. “Sharpen your swords. Get yourselves fresh shields and armour. The king’s smith will give you what you need. Rest and be ready, for when we ride, we will not stop until Wessex is taken.”
26
The Hel-hides left Grantabridge three days before Guthrum planned to march on Wareham. Geirmund’s warriors would reach the river-border between Mercia and Wessex on the fourth day and begin raiding the towns there. On the ninth day, they were to ride south towards the Roman ruin on the River Exe to meet more than two hundred longships under the command of the Dane-kings Oscetel and Anwend, who sailed from East Anglia, there to wait until Guthrum called for them. That would give the Danes two holds in Wessex from which they could raid the lands of Defenascire and Wiltescire, and take Ælfred’s seat in Wintanceastre. It was even said that Ubba might return from raiding in Irland and Wealas to join the attack, and though Geirmund worried what would happen if he should meet him, his warriors believed the presence of a son of Ragnar to be a good omen.
They journeyed down the Icknield Way, a road Geirmund had already travelled with Jarl Sidroc and John, but they left that path some distance from Wælingford and rode west to avoid Ælfred’s scouts. On the evening of the fourth day, they came to the edge of a birch wood and looked down into a valley, where a large market town sat on the River Thames with a monastery and a bridge.
“This is where we cross into Wessex.” Geirmund dismounted from Enbarr. “We’ll attack after dark and burn it. Then we ride on.”
“There is silver to be had down there,” Thorgrim said. “Those monks–”
“We can spare no time for plunder,” Geirmund said. “Think instead of your ten pounds when we return.”
Thorgrim turned to Birna, shaking his head, and she shrugged. A few other warriors grumbled, and Geirmund turned to face his Hel-hides as they sat slouched on their horses among the pale trees.
“Hark, all of you,” he said, putting steel in his voice. “Remember what we are here to do and remember the oath you made to the other warriors of this company. The time to balk has long passed. If your lust for plunder is greater than your honour, you should have stayed in Grantabridge with the other cowards, where your fate would have found you drunk in a cowshed or taking a piss.”
His warriors stood up straighter at that, as though a wind had come through and lifted them like a field of grain. Steinólfur folded his arms close and covered his mouth to hide a grin.
“You are here now,” Geirmund said. “It is here your fate will find you, and I will have no Hel-hide meet it with dishonour. Now, get off your horses and take what rest you can.” He turned and pointed at the distant town. “In the deep-night we become trolls and put a fear of more than death into those Saxons.” He looked into the eyes of every warrior within reach of his gaze, catching nods of agreement after that.
“You heard him,” Thorgrim said, climbing down from his horse, and the rest of the company followed.
Geirmund led Enbarr away from them for a short distance, and a few moments later Steinólfur sidled up next to him.
“Trolls?” the older warrior asked.
“Or devils.” Geirmund leaned against a birch with peeling bark. “Whatever the Saxons see when their dreams turn evil.” He looked at the tree, and then he tore off a large piece of its bark, which he turned over in his hands, thinking. “They fear trolls. There were beasts in the books Torthred showed me.”
“I know that cast in your eye,” Steinólfur said. “You have a plan.”
Geirmund unrolled the curl in the tree bark. “You know why we are here. We must do something Ælfred cannot ignore.”
“You think he’ll ignore us when we torch his towns?”
“Not at first.” Geirmund nodded towards his warriors. “But if the people of the towns we visit tell him we are but a single war-band, he may not come after us with his army. He might even realize Guthrum’s plan and look for the true Dane army elsewhere.”
“What are you saying? That we should kill all the witnesses?”
Geirmund shook his head. Then he poked his thumb through one of the black knots in the white bark. “I’m saying the witnesses should not know what they have seen.” He raised the wood to his face, like a mask, with one eye peering through the hole he had made. “Ælfred will hear of a howling pack of troll-Danes and devils harrowing his people in the deep-night, and that is a riddle the cunning Saxon king will have to solve.”
Steinólfur nodded, but slowly, as if seeing the plan come into view. “Some might say there is n
o honour behind a mask.”
Geirmund lowered the piece of bark. “To hide behind a mask in fear or shame is not honourable, but we are neither afraid nor ashamed. Against these Saxon townsfolk, a mask is simply cunning, and when we go to battle, we will face the enemy without them.” Geirmund handed the bark to Steinólfur. “Spread the word that every warrior is to become a troll that would frighten their own children. Their horses also.”
The older warrior looked at the piece of bark, and then gave it a tap with his knuckle. “I’ll see it done.”
He walked away, and Geirmund used his bronze knife to cut off another piece of bark from the tree. He carved holes for eyes and a jagged mouth that turned his mask into a kind of skull, which he fitted with a leather cord to tie around his head. He then cut a few more strips of bark, which he rolled and bent to give Enbarr horns, and he fashioned both of them bark-skin where he could attach more pieces of wood.
By the time he finished the moon had risen, and he turned to find his Hel-hides had almost vanished in the darkness, replaced by pale fiends and trolls with branches for antlers and fangs, and faces shaped like wolves, wyrms, and other nameless fears. They stood ready and restless in the forest, clad in twisted bark the colour of old bones, as though the birch trees had torn free of their roots and come to dreadful life.
“Now your hides are of Hel,” Geirmund said. “Your own fathers would shit themselves at the sight of you, and tonight we make these Saxons soil their beds.”
A low rumble of pleased laughter rolled through his warriors, and they set off down into the valley, walking their horses in the treacherous darkness. As they crept closer to the town, they could hear the distant, deep-night chanting of the monks, and they halted at the edge of the settlement’s fields until the priests had finished praying and returned to their beds. Neither the town nor the monastery had defensive walls, and only a few warriors had been set to watch.
“When will these Saxons learn?” Skjalgi asked. His mask reminded Geirmund of a snow-fox, and it muffled the boy’s voice.
“We could wait here until the fools have built defences, if you prefer,” Birna said from behind a draugr-like face.
“Their temples needed no walls before the Danes came,” Vetr said. “But they will learn.”
“That is why we must take Wessex now,” Geirmund said, and pulled out his fire-flint. “Light your torches. Spread out and put fire to all that you see. Howl and wail like beasts in the wind. Fight them only when you cannot break away.” He pointed south, in the direction of the river. “Make your way to the bridge. I expect it will be defended, so prepare for arrows and a battle there. Then we cross.”
“And those who do not reach the bridge?” Steinólfur asked. “What of them?”
Geirmund looked across the masks leering at him out of the night and tried to see past them to the warriors beneath. “I will leave none behind, but the Hel-hides must ride on without me, for Guthrum and for Daneland. All who make it to the bridge must be gone before the town raises its defences.”
That did not seem to sit easily with his warriors, but none refused.
Geirmund then struck sparks from his fire-flint into his torch and blew the embers into a blaze. He climbed onto Enbarr’s back, and when his warriors had all lit their flames, he raised his torch and charged out across the field towards the town with a roar. A moment later, hooves thundered at his back, and his warriors raised a shrieking squall that could freeze blood and turn even the bravest warrior pale with fear. Geirmund’s howl turned to laughter that echoed inside his mask.
An acre-length from the nearest hut, a cry finally went up from the warrior at watch, but he turned and fled, rather than staying to fight, and Geirmund held his torch under the first building’s thatch.
The Hel-hides galloped past him into the town, swinging axes and lighting fires along the way, and when they reached a crossroads near the monastery, some warriors rode down a byway to the west, while others drove southward, and a few went to see what harm they could do to the Christian temple. Geirmund watched the doors and windows of the buildings they had already set alight for enemies that might try to defend the town, but the only villagers who appeared seemed intent on fleeing and nothing more, mostly women and children.
Geirmund spurred Enbarr into a trot down what seemed to be the town’s market road from the river. A thick grey smoke soon choked the air, a glowing red haze filled with rushing shadows that turned it into Muspelheim, and Geirmund’s Hel-hides into fire jötnar. Animals squawked and bellowed, and somewhere in the direction of the monastery a bell rang.
Two hundred paces on, he entered the market square, where stalls and wagons burned, and several of his warriors raced through shouting curses. Another two hundred paces or more brought him to the river, where it seemed many of his Hel-hides had already gathered. Geirmund rode up to the front and found Steinólfur.
“Let us hope all towns in Wessex are so easily dealt with,” he said to the older warrior.
“We’re not across the river yet. Look.”
Geirmund turned towards the bridge, where he saw a single boy standing guard, wearing a plain helmet that sat low and tipped sideways on his small head, and holding a sword and shield that seemed far too heavy for him.
“Who will clear the bridge?” Steinólfur asked, but Geirmund understood the true meaning of his question. No Hel-hide would enjoy killing such a boy.
“I will see to it,” Geirmund said.
He climbed down from Enbarr and strode towards the bridge, whereupon the boy widened his feet and made sure of his grip on the sword. Geirmund chose not to draw his own weapon, but he halted a few paces from the young warrior in case the boy knew more about using his blade than it seemed.
“What is your name?” Geirmund asked, making his voice harsh behind his mask.
The boy said nothing.
“Your name, whelp!”
“Es-Esmond,” the boy said.
“Esmond, we were not sent here to kill you. If we had been, my warriors would already be sucking the juice from your eyes and gnawing the gristle from your bones.”
The boy’s thin neck bobbed as he swallowed.
“We are sent from Hel,” Geirmund went on. “We come to clear the way for a great Dane army that marches down from the north.” He took a step towards the child. “What is this place called?”
“Abingdon,” Esmond said.
“And where are the warriors of Abingdon?”
“They fight for the king, Ælfred, who is God’s king, and–” Esmond raised the point of his sword. “And he will destroy you.”
Geirmund looked around. “I see no king here. Are there none left but you to defend this place?”
His eyes held spite and boldness. “They all fled.”
“But you did not.” Geirmund took another step towards him. “You would make a strong Hel-hide, Esmond of the iron will.” He looked at the boy’s sword, the hilt of which glinted silver in the moonlight, alive with birds and other animals inlaid in black. “That is a fine weapon. Know that if you raise it against me, I will have to kill you, and my warriors will feast on your flesh. But if you give it to me, we will pass you by and you shall live. What say you?”
The boy said nothing and held still.
“Neither your god nor your king want you to die this night, boy, and I do not want to kill you. Do you wish to die?”
“You–you say Danes are coming?”
“I do, and they are.”
Another moment passed. Then Esmond spun and tossed both his sword and his shield off the bridge, and before they had even splashed into the water, he raced away from the town, and into the night. Geirmund looked down at the river and almost grinned.
By then it seemed the Hel-hides had all gathered, watching him and waiting as the town burned behind them. Geirmund felt the hot wind of the flames against his face as h
e returned to Enbarr, hoping that most of the guiltless townsfolk had fled, and climbed back into his saddle.
“That was a waste of a good sword,” Steinólfur said.
Geirmund shrugged. “Better than to waste a good warrior.”
“Even a good Saxon warrior?” Thorgrim asked. “Boys most often grow into men, if I am not mistaken.”
“When that boy grows into a man, he will remember that his life was spared, but before that, perhaps Ælfred will learn of what I said to him.” Geirmund turned to Steinólfur. “Are all here?”
The older warrior nodded. “All are here.”
“Then let us move on.”
They crossed the Thames from Abingdon into Wessex, following a trackway south until the first hint of dawn sent them towards a forest to the east. They pushed deep enough into that woodland of alder and oak that they could camp without being seen, but to be sure none would find them they lit no fires and ate their food cold and dried. Then Geirmund set watches so his warriors could take some rest, and he went to Rafn and Vetr.
“We need to know when Ælfred is near,” he said.
“You want us to scout?” Vetr asked, and Geirmund nodded.
“We will take Skjalgi with us,” Rafn said. “The boy has sharp eyes.”
Geirmund agreed. He thought Steinólfur might worry over it, but Skjalgi had proven himself a warrior, and in truth was no longer a boy, though out of affection it would likely be some time before the Hel-hides called him otherwise.
Rafn and Vetr went to find Skjalgi, and Geirmund found himself a quiet place under a giant yew to rest. Its branches touched the ground like the woven green walls and roof of a hut, and it was old enough that time had hollowed out the tree’s trunk. A gap in the wood spread almost wide enough for a warrior to squeeze through, but inside the yew was too dark for Geirmund to see, and he kept away from the opening. It was a tree to which seers would listen and make offerings, a tree that remembered the gods, and upon which a god might hang for nine days and nights. Red berries grew on its branches like splattered droplets of blood.
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