by Hume, M. K.
Sigrid grinned wickedly to express her contempt for anything her mother could say to her. Arthur sighed, aware of the friction between mother and daughter.
‘Be careful, you stupid child,’ her mother complained. ‘You’d best take care of your brother if you’re incapable of doing anything else. I’ll prepare the master’s meat in your place and clean up the mess you’ve made. By the gods, Sigrid, you never used to be this cloth-witted and clumsy.’
As if Arthur wasn’t present, Sigrid attacked her mother with relish.
‘But I wasn’t a slave then, was I, Mother? Nor was I expected to serve the man who murdered my father. If he wants his meat, he should cook it himself.’
‘Hush, you stupid girl!’ Ingrid hissed, darting a nervous glance in Arthur’s direction. ‘We’d be dead now if the master hadn’t taken us under his protections.’
‘I’d rather be dead than remain alive in his service.’
‘That’s easy to say, girl! Would you have preferred to have your brother’s brains dashed out? You’re a selfish little cow, daughter.’
‘And you’d like to be a whore for the British bastard, Mother,’ she sneered. ‘I believe you’ve already forgotten my father.’
Arthur heard the sharp sound of a slap, followed by an indrawn breath and a half-sob. Then the girl charged out of the tent through the back flap.
Ingrid bowed low in front of Arthur, her shaking hands clutching at the offending packages of meat.
‘I apologise for my daughter’s behaviour, my lord. I don’t know what to do with her, but I pray that you don’t punish her for her intemperate words. Her father adored her and I’m afraid that he may have spoiled her when he treated her more like a boy than a girl. Now she refuses to understand the way that our world works for women. Please, my lord, I’ll do my best to convince her to behave.’
Ingrid wept freely while her hands absently unwrapped the cabbage leaves, her large blue eyes drenched with tears of misery and fear.
‘The girl’s a damned nuisance, Ingrid. Can’t you control her? Look, I don’t have time to think about Sigrid at the moment. We’ll be moving into the south soon, and that might be a good time to tell your daughter I could be killed in battle. That should cheer her up.’
Ingrid’s eyes registered her horror at his joke. All women understood the painful reality of life in the northern climes, regardless of whether they were queens or slaves. Regardless of Sigrid’s execrable behaviour, Arthur had refrained from beating her or punishing her in any other way. Ingrid had seen the gloating, salacious expressions on the faces of the Dene warriors who came to their tent. Rape would be the automatic fate of most women and the punishment for any young woman who constantly put herself at risk of angering their master. Yet he had not attempted to even touch them. Even his requirements of them were minimal. If there was food on his table, he ate. If there was none, he seemed totally unconcerned.
As for his attentions to women, her master seemed to favour fleeting relationships. She had spoken with many of the young slave women and girls who had warmed his bed. They all seemed to worship the earth under his feet, for he endowed them with the self-respect lacking in their daily lives.
So why did he ignore her? And, more importantly, why did he show such patience with Sigrid? As a beautiful woman who had been courted all her life, Ingrid didn’t know whether to be insulted or grateful for his restraint.
‘I’d rather you don’t talk of Sigrid, woman, but you needn’t be too upset about it – at least for the moment. I’m not in the habit of hurting children.’
He smiled across at her, which lightened her gloomy fears.
‘Now, what’s to eat? I’ve been trying to talk sense into Dene skulls all afternoon, so I could eat a horse.’
‘I only need to stir more meat into the stew and it will be ready. I’ve added real onions to give more taste to the broth and there are carrots in it as well.’
Ingrid’s son shifted in her sling and she felt warm urine soak through his loincloth. With a small sigh for the washing this accident would cause, her hand sought out the old knife her master had given her for household duties and protection. The meat was sliced thinly under her careful fingers and she added the off-cuts to the pot.
‘How is your son?’ Arthur asked quietly, although her eyes noted the tiny twitch of his nostrils.
He can smell the child’s piss, damn it! she cursed inwardly.
‘The child’s growing quickly, master.’ Ingrid made an odd decision that comforted her. ‘He will grow strong so that he can serve you and guard your back from harm when he is big enough. I believe that little Ingmar is destined to become a true man who will learn at your knee.’
Arthur blushed – just as Ingrid had intended. He knew what his slave woman was about: saving her infant son, ensuring that the boy’s future was linked to the success of his master.
But the honour conferred on him by this proud Geat aristocrat was very flattering for an unhappy refugee from a foreign land. In this northern world, where a woman and her word had more weight and strength than in the British nations, she had allied her family to his interests for the remainder of her life. Arthur felt a strange combination of embarrassment, pleasure and irritation.
‘Don’t talk nonsense, Ingrid, although I thank you for the compliments. Now, change the boy . . . And you needn’t worry about our supper, for I’ll ensure that the stew doesn’t boil over. There’s no need to look so shocked, woman, for my mother and sisters would give me a thick ear if I didn’t watch the pot.’
His eyes were suddenly dark with sadness, so Ingrid knew that he was beset by memories of home and the mother who waited beyond the grey waters for news of him. Sensitive to his moods, she turned away.
‘I’ll think of something to do with Sigrid after we’ve eaten,’ Arthur promised her. ‘I’ll not punish her unnecessarily.’
Or at least no more than the little bitch deserves, he told himself. Warmth spread in the pit of his belly as he considered a churlish revenge.
‘I’ve been far too patient with her,’ he told himself, as Ingrid left him alone with the cooking pot and his thoughts. The fire spat wickedly as a globule of fat sizzled in the hot coals, but no heat could match the fire of dissatisfaction that grew ever hotter inside him.
CHAPTER III
Men of Grass
The days of man are but as grass:
for he flourisheth as a flower of a field.
For as soon as the wind goeth over it, it is gone:
and the place thereof shall know it no more.
The Book of Common Prayer, Psalm 103
A horse charged at Arthur suddenly with maddened eyes and sharp, upraised hooves. Riderless, it attacked the line in a frenzy of terror, with blood staining its flanks while more pumped sluggishly from an axe wound in the shoulder. Before he could deflect the beast with his sword, a hoof struck his thigh a glancing blow that almost felled him. Arthur reeled in agony but on one side the adjacent warrior’s arm reached out to steady him and, on the other, a shield was rammed in front of his face. Cursing as he massaged his injured thigh, Arthur caught a quick glimpse of the battlefield before Snorri’s shield blocked his view.
Chaos swirled around the fighting square. The cavalry charge had hit the massed Geat army on Arthur’s left with the force of a thunderclap, and every Dene had felt the dislocating aftershock run through them from the soles of their boots to the press of bodies thrust desperately against the wall of shields.
Along the right flank, the reserves under Stormbringer that Arthur had sent to the battle site by stealth in the days before his own arrival struck out on the opposite side of the Geat army. Once again, the Dene warriors in the centre of this melee of desperate men felt the shock of an attack from the rear. All that Arthur could see in front of him, during that split second before Snorri’s shield had sna
pped back into place, was the bloody detritus of wounded men and the closely packed warriors under attack from two sides. Dead men were held upright by the close thrust of their companions and the retreat of both sides of Heardred’s army from the two attacks. Pressed against the shields of their enemies, they were impaled on spears, hamstrung by axes or stabbed by swords, yet even the wounded were unable to turn away from the weapons that were killing them. Terrorised horses flailed out with sharp, iron-clad hoofs as warriors turned on each other, desperate to find some open space in which to retreat, or attack, as the opportunity permitted.
The defining moment in the conflict had arrived. Now, Arthur’s decisions would decide the outcome of the battle. Although his thigh ached, his brain was filled with a ruthless surge of power – and he knew exactly where his duty lay. If he kept his nerve, Heardred would be smashed permanently, so now was the time for an all-out, relentless attack.
Around him Arthur could feel the mood of the six hundred men who had endured so much and displayed such discipline and resolve. The warriors were like ravenous fighting hounds as every muscle in their bodies quivered to use their swords in a sustained attack. But could they turn as a single unit and push outwards to strike into the heart of the enemy who were now caught on two sides between two fresh Dene forces?
Arthur could feel their pent-up eagerness. These men would obey him to the death, but their consuming desire was to charge outwards in four directions, so they smashed into the disorganised enemy with axes and swords. His warriors cried out silently with their eyes to release their frustration and rage at the blows and insults of Geat taunts throughout the long morning. Arthur made the final, irrevocable decision: the time to attack had come.
‘Pass the message down the line,’ Arthur roared. ‘When you see the red flag has been raised, each side will attack at their front and push outward! No quarter and no surrender! For Stormbringer!’
Arthur pulled a long strip of narrow cloth from under his cuirass. He handed it to Snorri, who attached it to the head of a long spear. ‘Raise it high, Snorri,’ Arthur ordered. Then he began to shout his orders to his troops and the refrain was repeated, again and again, as the Dene warriors began to push outward, with their breasts heaving against those of their foes.
‘For the Dragon’s Brood! For Stormbringer! For the children!’
The Dene warriors began to kill in earnest now – and the afternoon was ruddy with their raised swords and axes. The air reverberated with their war-cries. A waning sun blazed onto the bloody fray as the Dene continued to kill in an ecstasy of rage. All the frustrations were eased now by the fresh blood that soaked the thirsty earth.
Arthur remained at their head in the centre of the line, drenched with fresh and dried blood over his gleaming armour as a red pennon streamed over his head. The Geat warriors recognised him as the Last Dragon and their hearts quailed. Their jarls saw the fresh troops harrying their flanks and driving them into the maw of the fighting square, and recognised the cavalry charge as a Dene tactic designed to demoralise them.
At the last, they were aware that their king had been leading them towards ruin, and the Stormbringer and the Last Dragon had capitalised on his stupidity.
The jarls died and cursed Heardred with eyes of stone turned towards the ridge where their king was watching the carnage he had begun with such casual hubris. In contrast the Last Dragon and Stormbringer stood four square, prepared to bleed with their warriors, as they took the self-same risks as the lowliest warrior in the line.
What the king was thinking as he watched the flower of Geat youth die below him was moot, for any orders that came from his lips were blown away on the breeze.
Three weeks earlier, the Dene fleet had sailed north towards the small, but very important, port of Calmar. Two-thirds of the fleet sailed beyond the inland island of Oland, which protected Calmar from the wild winter storms of the inner sea.
Stormbringer commanded this section of the Dene forces and he would control the cavalry and those warriors responsible for trapping the Geat army at the religious colony, far to the north, if all went well in the initial battle.
Meanwhile, Arthur was in command of the remainder of the fleet as it entered the calm waters of the channel between the island and the mainland. The glassy waters leading to Calmar were shining like polished silver in the sunlight. The island also served to block the wind, so the great woollen sails of the Dane fleet flapped and sagged as the vessels slowed to a crawl.
Arthur saw a beacon erected on a stone tower as it was set alight by Geat defenders. The day was new and crisp, with autumn nipping at the Dene heels. The waterways would soon wear a crust of ice and winter storms would force all seafarers to settle into makeshift quarters for the winter or retreat to a place of sanctuary such as The Holding. But any retreat would provide Heardred with time to reorganise his Geat forces, so Arthur and Stormbringer were rolling the dice while they still had sufficient warriors and ships at their disposal.
Arthur watched another beacon flare into life on a distant hill and imagined the line of fires that would be burning across Gotland to warn the Geat king that marauders had sailed into Calmar. The first step in his complex plan had now been taken. He prayed that he had thought of every eventuality.
All the buildings of Calmar seemed to Arthur to be the colour of mud from his vantage point alongside Snorri at the rudder. As he ordered the sail to be lowered and the oars to begin their long and regular strokes, he looked at the longboats around him, all of whose crews were clearing their decks in preparation for combat. Sea Wife was leading an arrowhead formation that mimicked the flight of the wild geese that had passed above him earlier in their voyage and he marvelled at how men unwittingly copied the works of nature.
‘God is the great master, Snorri,’ Arthur murmured. ‘He is the sailor whose ways we copy in our imperfect fashion. May the Good Lord guard us this day, not just for our sake, but for the lost children of Lund.’
Snorri had caught the depth of feeling in Arthur’s whispered prayer. Although Snorri accepted that his master was an outlander with odd fancies, the helmsman had never seen any evidence that Arthur was particularly religious. Then he shrugged. A little supernatural assistance couldn’t hurt, since the small fleet was sailing into harm’s way, not once, but twice. And the second time, the Dene force would be using Arthur’s strange outlander tactics to ensure their survival.
Snorri snorted when he thought of those heavy rectangular shields. Standing in a line with the cursed things interlocked was hard work, as he had learned during the hours of practice back at the base camp. However Arthur was his master and had earned his respect. In addition, Snorri had come to like Arthur, so he would stand beside this strange Briton when the tortoise movement was required and not falter, even if he thought the whole strategy was crazy.
Along the smooth, silvery beach, some of the Geat ships were leaning to one side with the bottom of their keels buried in the sand, while other deeper-drafted vessels were moored to pilings constructed from whole tree trunks embedded deeply into the mud and sand of the bay.
As the Dene longboats mustered before the attack, Arthur had spoken directly to his captains to ensure their obedience to his orders.
‘There will be no mercy for Geat warriors! But I’ll not repeat Heardred’s sins, so the women and children will be spared. Hear me, my captains! There will be no rape under my command. We are not greedy marauders who seek reparation from the Geat king. We will take what slaves we wish when the campaign is over, but I’ll not leave seething hatred behind us to fuel the resentments of future generations. We go into battle for the children of Lund, and that shall be our battle cry!’
And then the race to destroy the Geat fleet began as the rowers took to their oars.
‘Are the fire pots ready?’ Arthur shouted down to Thorketil who had taken over part of the stern as his preparation area. The b
ig man rose to his feet, his shaggy bear-fur collar making him look even more like a troll king than ever. The strappings on his wounded leg were even more obvious than usual as he struggled to keep his footing on the smooth deck.
‘Aye, Master Arthur. The pots are filled with pitch, exactly as you ordered.’
‘As we approach each vessel, send a lit fire pot into the widest part of the Geat trading ships. Pitch is difficult to extinguish, so one pot per ship should be sufficient, and the crews won’t be expecting it. Row your hearts out now, brothers! The Geats know what we’re about, so they’re trying to move their ships out of danger.’
Arthur’s voice was controlled, almost joyous, as he checked the shoreline and observed a clutch of small rowing boats burdened almost to the waterline by seamen intent on saving their vessels. But they were already too late.
Sea Wife drew close to a large vessel that was obviously designed to carry large cargoes of trade goods. Thorketil let out a wild, tribal call and swung a lit fire pot around his head on the end of its chain. At the furthest point of its swing, the Troll King let loose the pot with its trail of red hot sparks directly into the centre of the wooden ship. Within moments, fire gushed up in a long sheet as the decking caught alight.
‘Well done, Thorketil. Now, on to the next!’
Arthur selected his next target from the moored vessels in what could only be described as a light-hearted mood. Negotiating Sea Wife through the shallow waters, Snorri marvelled at how boyish his master became whenever battle beckoned.
All in all, six ships were soon burning fiercely down to their waterlines while another twenty were in flames along the beach. Nor did Arthur spare the fishing boats or the one-man coracles. Nothing that rode on Mother Water was permitted to survive on that day of fire.
Then the Briton turned his attention to the township and the farmlands beyond it.
The Dene longboats were soon lined up along the beach and, the moment the prows drove into the shingle, men leaped into the ankle-deep foam. They were holding their new shields with a little awkwardness, but were more than willing to use the iron as a weapon, as well as a protection. Sharpened, and at close quarters, the shield could be driven up into an enemy’s throat or chin.