It was not long. They began to hear the sweep of boughs and cracking of branches. This was followed by the unmistakable sound of bridle hardware, that jingling of bits that ever announces the nearness of ridden horses. A human voice sounded low; that of a man, doubtless swearing an oath. They were coming as fast as they could, thinking they were being pursued down the track from behind. Ceric stood stock-still, not wanting to cause any rustle, but turned his head at their approach.
He saw the lead man, bending low over his horse’s neck to avoid being hit by the overarching branches. If the Dane had helmet or ring-shirt, he had not taken time to put them on. The man’s face was to the near side of his horse’s neck, the side the thegns of Wessex were ranged along. Ceric saw a mop of dark hair over a face glistening with sweat. The horse too was blowing, unhappy at the narrow path which it was being forced to walk along, and unhappy too at the severely shortened rein it was held at.
The horseman passed. Ceric’s heart felt like it was near to exploding in his chest. The second Dane passed, this one also bent low, but with his face off to his horse’s right side. He could only hope the man they tackled would be the same, looking away when Worr seized him.
The third man surprised him; he was on foot, holding his horse tightly and leading him. The man’s sightlines were thus just at the level where the thegns hid, and Ceric knew he sucked in his breath, seeing this. But the man’s gaze was fixed on the rump of the horse before him.
The fourth Dane. He was mounted, again crouched low over his horse’s neck. Ceric saw the face, the eyes looking almost straight at the trees behind which he and Worr stood hidden. This should be their man, he reckoned, and his startle would be the less as his face was turned towards the movement they would make as they sprang at him. Like the others, he wore no ring-shirt nor helmet. Like the others, he held no weapons, but used both hands to guide and urge his horse forward.
The fourth man began passing them; Ceric saw the hind legs of the horse lift and fall. Then a yell rang out.
“Ælfred!” screamed that King’s son. It came out in two bellows, sounded like a warrant of death.
Ceric sprang, and so did Worr. Golden-hilted sword uplifted in his right hand, Ceric leapt at the head of the horse, a big and raw-boned roan. His left hand snatched at and missed the rein, then lunging deeper closed around the cheek-piece of the bridle. The horse snorted and shied, trying to toss its hard-held head.
Ceric saw the blur of brown that was Worr, tackling the Dane’s shoulders with both arms, wrenching him down. The Dane’s left foot caught a moment in the stirrup, the man twisting, looking up at them as he hung, howling out an oath. In the time it took him to fall free Worr had his sword out, and plunged it through the man’s body.
Horses and men were both screaming; Ceric heard Worr yell as he drove his weapon through the Dane’s chest. Beyond Worr he could see the next two men grappling with their Dane, and see the man be felled by the hacking blows of both. The horse Ceric held was bucking and dancing, turning and crashing into the shrubby growth lining the track, and Ceric turned with it, trying to keep himself out of the way of the hooves. Then Worr yelled at him.
Ceric whirled about. The Dane who had been leading his horse had broken away from the two thegns who had set upon him, leaping to his horse’s far side and away. Now he stood, sword drawn, and thrust forward at Ceric.
He was older than Ceric, Worr’s age perhaps. His long light brown hair swung freely over his shoulders, and his eyes were a blue that crackled beneath a furrowed brow as he closed in. His upper lip was lifted, showing his teeth. Through his snarl came a hissing stream of oaths.
Ceric’s eye was drawn to the sword waving before him, a common piece of metal with a plain iron hilt and grip. And he saw the Dane’s eye drop a moment to his own weapon, with its gold hilt and pattern of waving blue steel beaten into the working part of it. Ceric’s hand tightened about that gold hilt.
Without a shield there was nothing Ceric could do but attack. The Dane bore no shield either; it was hanging on his frightened horse, now blocking the way of the thegns who had gone after him. Ceric sprang closer, further from the big roan; they were enclosed by the narrowness of the track and the bodies of the two horses.
Ceric had ring-shirt and helmet, the Dane had neither. The protections afforded Ceric also slowed him. And the Dane was battle-hardened; Ceric knew this from one look at the man’s face. He had fought and overcome many times in the past.
Ceric swung at the Dane’s left arm. The man was taller than he, but protected as he was, he got in close. The Dane leapt back, then quickly forward and to the side, his sword cutting through the air and back towards Ceric’s sword arm. Ceric lifted it, hearing the bright steel ring out as the blades met, staggering back a step as he absorbed the force in his opponent’s blow. The Dane’s blade ran a hand’s length down his own as the man’s lunge propelled him forward. Then, seeing he had met only steel, the Dane pulled back, rocking on his heels.
At this slight pause Ceric shifted his sword, bringing it closer to his own body. The Dane lurched forward at him, as if he had gained momentum through the act of rocking backwards an instant. Ceric saw a flash of metal, and felt his own sword being wrenched from his grasp. The bright thing fell from his hand as the Dane’s blade cut down upon it. He stood, stunned, as the man’s sword rose again, aiming for his chest.
He threw himself against the roan horse, causing the beast to whinny, and its hindquarters to swing towards him. The horse’s head and front hooves struck out towards the Dane, giving Ceric a chance to snatch at his sword, lying upon the trampled ferns and torn mosses of the path.
He was still in his crouch when he drove forward with it. He caught the Dane first in the right leg with a slash. The man’s mouth opened as he dropped to his knees. Ceric was fully standing now, and sunk his sword point with a driving thrust into the belly of the Dane.
He pulled back his weapon. The man pitched slowly forward, face-first onto the softness of the moss. His eyes were rolling up as he fell, and though they paused to look at Ceric, he could read nothing in their look. They seemed to change from bright blue to dull grey as Ceric stood there, panting, over him.
He was aware Worr was now at his side, and the two thegns who had been blocked had pushed their way past the dead man’s horse to reach where they stood.
Worr’s arm was about his shoulders; he knew that without feeling it. His eyes fell on the tip of Godwulf’s sword. It was filmed with blood, the same blood now seeping out from beneath the Dane’s body, and darkening the mosses on which he lay.
Ceric let out a breath. He had heard the Dane’s oaths at the start of their contest, but everything since had been muffled. Now his ears were filled. Horses were snorting and stamping, and men – men of Wessex – were calling and cheering. His hand was cramping from the tightness of his grasp upon his sword.
Worr was speaking to him.
“Well, and rightly, done,” he praised.
Ceric knew he was trembling, and felt it showed.
“He almost killed me,” he answered, eyes again on the body before him.
In the pause that followed Ceric turned back to Worr, his stare boring through the iron-rimmed eye protectors of his helmet. Worr’s own eyes were bright with what they had both just done.
“But he did not,” his friend said, “and nothing else matters. You gave him an opening, drawing back and shifting when you did. But you kept your head and used what you had – a horse – to win out.”
There was no time for more; Eadward’s voice sounded above all. Ceric found himself bending to wipe his sword tip on the new ferns at the track’s edge. He took hold of the roan horse’s head. Men were hoisting the bodies of the dead Danes upon their horses, and after the man Worr had felled was slung upon the roan, he helped the two thegns with the body of the one he had killed. They followed the track out into the pasture, out into the brightness of day.
The Danes’ horses,
freed from the confines of the woodland track, were no less troubled now they were in the open. Each bore the weight of a dead man slung over its saddle. From each man blood streamed, the smell of which made the beasts snort and dance, despite the firmness with which they were held. The thegns of Kilton who had been tasked with taking the walking Dane pressed the reins of the dead man’s horse into Ceric’s hand; he had made the kill, and those who had dispatched their men walked at the beasts’ heads, leading the newly captured animals.
They rejoined their companions in the field, and mounted their own horses. As they approached the trev the folk gathered before them. Eadward was at the head of the troop, one made seven horses larger. Several of the village women were crying, but all looked up to him with grateful faces. The Prince got off his own mount, and gestured to his men to pull the bodies down.
Ceric gave a tug to the back of the Dane he had killed, and the man slid off and hit the ploughed ground. The saddle was slick with blood, and there was blood also along the flank and rear leg of the horse. Much of it had flowed from the killing strike to the body, but some too from the gash in the man’s right thigh.
He watched Eadward roll, with his foot, the man he had himself killed, face to the sky. Ceric’s man had flopped face up when he fell, one bloody leg bent back behind him, pinned in a way that would have been painful to the living.
Eadward passed in front of the dead, looking on their faces. After he did so, several of the villagers did the same, staring at the men who might have caused them even further harm. They were not those who had killed four of them this morning, but that did not matter. Here were seven less Danes to despoil their folk and foodstuffs, seven fewer to return with their hard-earned grain to the enemy camp.
Eadward turned to his men. “Those of you who killed, strip them and take what you will. But bring me their purses.”
The Prince watched his men kneel and take what battle-gain was to be found. Each Dane bore a sword and knife, each had a round shield. All had pins of bronze at the shoulder to fasten the mantles rolled in their saddle-bags, and a few wore necklets or bracelets of silver.
Ceric had never touched a dead man before. When he was a boy and Kilton was attacked he walked through the blood of the dead, but he had never done what he did now, kneel at a man’s head, put his hand in the man’s neck-opening, against his still-warm chest, to see if he wore a chain of precious metal, pull back the sleeves of his worn tunic to see if any silver cuff sat upon the wrist. His man bore nothing, and his eye was caught at the sight of the Dane’s sword hand, strong, calloused, dark hair upon the back of that hand, the hand that might have killed him.
He had no care for the man’s short boots nor clothing; he would leave them. But now he must unbuckle the sword and knife belt. One of the thegns had slipped the dead man’s sword back into its scabbard. Ceric’s hands went to the twinned buckles. All about the man’s torso was dark with blood, and Ceric’s fingers fumbled and slipped as he worked the buckles and straps. He had to tighten the strap to free it, and the act of doing so caused a fresh issue of blood to ooze forth from the wound. The blow he had driven into the man’s belly was straight, his sword withdrawn with no upper or lower thrust. Yet the smell of the warm blood, and the odour of the entrails he had punctured, made him close his eyes for a moment.
He pulled the two belts off, having to lift the man’s body a moment to do so. He wiped his bloodied fingers in the crumbling soil he knelt on. The man’s purse was next, a small pouch of leather that Ceric snapped by its securing strings from the belt holding the man’s leggings.
He stood then, weapons belts in one hand, the tiny purse in the other, and came forward to Eadward, Worr behind him. A small trestle table had been carried to him, and the other men were now standing before it, holding what they claimed as battle-gain, and placing the dead men’s purses before their Prince.
Eadward looked at Ceric as he filed before him, nodding at him. The youth had pulled his helmet off, and his coppery-gold hair was being tousled by the steady Spring breezes. Eadward let his eyes meet the green eyes of this scion of Kilton. He knew Ceric was the youngest man there, and thought it likely his first kill.
“The hall of Kilton has done well,” Eadward said, glancing behind Ceric to where the dead man lay. Ceric nodded, ducking his head as he placed the dark leather pouch down.
“I thank you, my Lord,” he murmured.
He went back to stand with the other thegns. The Dane’s weapons were heavy in the hand, and he felt of a sudden weak. He glanced again at the man he had killed, thinking of how his sword had felt in his hand when it had entered the man’s body. When he had slashed at the leg he had felt some resistance. But unprotected by even a leathern tunic the belly had yielded almost like a fruit. He forced his eyes up and away, planting his feet more firmly beneath him.
Eadward had emptied the contents of the purses. Some held little save for talismans. There was still silver enough, though, both coins and bits of coins, and hack-silver, pieces of broken jewellery and chopped lengths of silver rod.
He addressed the villagers now. “Bury these men, taking what you wish from them. This silver I leave with you. Divide half of it amongst those of you who lost folk; the other to all who suffered hurt or loss to croft and livestock.”
The folk answered this beneficence with muted but earnest thanks. Eadward signaled that his men should ready themselves to ride. The horses and their trappings would be forfeit to him, to add to the store needed to horse the thegns of Wessex. But each man who had killed had the honour of leading the beast so claimed. Ceric turned to the horse who had carried the Dane he had felled. It was a light bay gelding, compact, and well-muscled. As he made secure the horse’s reins to the tie-rings of his own saddle he saw the folk of the trev swarm the bodies of the dead. One grasped at the boots of the man he had killed, pulling them free.
He looked away, stooped to pick up the man’s weapons, now lying on the trampled furrows they stood on. As he rose he saw a lad was watching him, the same they had come upon running from the trev, and had carried back with them. Ceric had not spoken to the boy, but now gestured him forward. He was of fourteen or fifteen Summers, tall and gangly, his tunic sleeves too short for his growing frame. His hair was dark yellow, and a wisp of yellow fuzz was upon his upper lip.
Ceric wordlessly extended the Dane’s weapons to the lad. The boy’s lips parted, then closed. He took the weapons in both arms, clasped them to his chest. Those nearest had stopped in their salvaging, watching. The lad did not speak, and Ceric did not wish to. He gave a single nod, then pulled himself into his saddle. The boy stood unmoving, watching him ride off, holding a treasure of iron now his.
“There is no thinking on it,” Worr had counselled him, as they rode back to Kilton. “We were given orders. They were just. We followed them.”
Ceric did not respond, and Worr saw he was looking rigidly out over his horse’s head. The horse Ceric led was a constant reminder of the man he had killed.
“The first one is not easy,” Worr finally said. His voice told Ceric that he thought of his own first killing.
“Now it is behind you. And you had rare privilege to do so before the Prince. He regarded you well.” A moment more passed. “The next will not be this bad.”
Ceric nodded, and looked down into his horse’s mane. He lifted one hand to his breast, and touched the gold cross laying there beneath his tunic. Hrald came to his mind; he and Hrald as boys, listening to Sidroc the Dane tell them how to strip a man on the field of battle. Hrald’s father had numbered in sequence what to take and how to take it. Doing so on a real foe was as different as listening was from doing.
The act of reaching into the man’s tunic stood out in his mind. Plundering the still-warm body had nearly turned his stomach. He pictured a Dane doing the same to him, the hand finding something, grasping his own golden cross, ripping it from his neck, eyes alight at the hidden prize.
When Ceric an
d his troop returned to Kilton, three months had passed since he had entrusted his letter for Hrald to the King. In a fortnight he would ride to Bryeg to meet Ashild.
There had been a welcome feast at Kilton for those returned, and as none of his men had been lost nor suffered hurt it was undimmed by the lamenting of any woman. Before the feast had even begun all in the hall had heard of the ambush. They knew that eight of Kilton’s men had taken direct part, and three of them each killed a Dane. Edwin had heard the story at least twice, once from Ceric, and once again from Worr, and had asked many questions of them both. When all were seated, Edwin raised his cup to those returned, and led all in a toast. He could not keep from grinning as he held his cup to his brother.
After the plates and salvers had been cleared the old scop assumed his stool, harp on his lap, and began to sing, telling of the encounter in the woods. Ceric had always liked the man, Garrulf by name, who had been a part of every early memory of the hall. Now he heard how Garrulf’s skill took the rushed ugliness of the ambush and formed from it something heroic and stirring.
Ceric listened, but what Garrulf sang of seemed unreal. Ceric had nothing to show for his action. He had given the man’s blades to the boy, and the horse had been claimed by Eadward. He had brought nothing back to Kilton but the story, told haltingly by him, and more fully by Worr and the other thegns. Garrulf the scop made of it a small saga of his own.
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