The scop’s voice, modulated by many years of making itself heard over the tumult of a feast, rang out across the hubbub of sound. The conversations, stories, boasts and arguments died away as the men seated at the long tables that ran the length of the hall looked up from their neighbours to see the scop standing, waiting, in front of the royal table that ran crosswise across the top of the great hall.
The scop began to strum his lyre, the six strings ringing out through the space, and the few voices still speaking fell silent until the only sounds were the servants clearing up food, the dogs squabbling over scraps and the scop singing history.
Raising his voice into the half-chant, half-song of a story, the scop began to tell again the tale of the Battle of the River Idle, where Æthelfrith had fallen at the hands of Rædwald, and although all the men present knew the story well, yet they fell silent, listening with appreciation as the scop wound new rhymes and rhythms into his telling, mixing the normal poetic patterns with more complex bursts of sound that drew appreciative thumps upon the long tables. The description of how Æthelfrith the Twister fell and his drawn-out death brought gasps of sympathy and anger, for the scop brought to life the grief and revenge wrath of Rædwald and the disgrace of a great warrior such as Æthelfrith reduced to begging for his own death.
With a final series of rousing, rhythmical strums upon the lyre, the scop slammed the song to a close and stood smiling as the men in the hall shouted their appreciation and drummed the bone handles of their knives upon the wooden tables.
The king sat up straight upon the bench. To his right, Forthred propped his head upon his hand and closed his eyes. Edwin smiled and moved the cup, half full of sweet and very strong mead, out of reach. After all their years of exile, Forthred was enjoying the licence now to feast and drink without thought of care.
Waving the scop over, Edwin took a jewelled pin, albeit a small one, from his cloak and handed it to him.
“A good telling, Acca.”
“You think so? What about the lines where I made ‘Rædwald’ rhyme with ‘ball’? You don’t think that pushed it too far towards half-rhymes and lost the balance between the assonance and the rhyming scheme?”
Edwin thought on the matter, while the scop looked on anxiously. “You may be right about that…”
“I knew it, I knew it,” said Acca, hitting a fist into his palm in annoyance. “I knew it was wrong even as I sang the words. But what about the way I held the lyre back through Æthelfrith’s death, playing single strings rather than strumming? I’ve heard scops sing it strong, beating out the rhythm, but I thought by making it quiet and plaintive it would bring out the pity of his ending. Do you think that worked?”
“I would say…” Edwin paused, Acca leaned forward apprehensively, and Forthred’s head, propped upon his hand, slipped off and hit the table. “Yes,” finished Edwin. He signalled a servant to bring cold water for Forthred. “Now, pass the lyre round and let the men sing while you rest your voice, Acca. You have done well. But when next the lyre is passed to you, sing a story of one of my victories.”
“Oh, of course, lord; it’s just that the Battle of the River Idle has such a pathetic conclusion, it never fails to draw tears and cheers.”
“Whereas my victory over Lindsey simply ends with the king of Lindsey pledging allegiance to me. Nothing pathetic or heart-rending there.”
“No, my lord.”
Edwin leaned towards the scop. “Make something up then,” he said. “Sing a song that will make the men cry and cheer and gasp about me.”
“But these men, they were all with you when you defeated Lindsey,” said the scop. “How can I change what happened?”
Dropping his voice further, Edwin explained. “You don’t change anything, Acca. You tell it as it was, and the men will remember.”
Acca smiled. “Of course, my lord. Our memories are in our songs.”
Edwin nodded. “Precisely. Ensure my men remember well, Acca, and you will be well rewarded.”
The scop bowed and withdrew, already trying out under his breath variations on the old poetic patterns.
Forthred, head lying upon the table, moaned in uneasy dream. Edwin pointed a servant carrying a bowl of water towards Forthred and moved out of the way. The servant poured the water over Forthred’s spluttering, oath-uttering head, to roars of approval from the men sat at tables below.
While Forthred was still shaking his wet hair and glowering at the laughter raining down upon him from the men, Edwin leaned over and, placing his hand on his damp shoulder, said, “I want you awake and alert, Forthred.”
“Can’t take your drink, Forthred?” Swaying in front of the high table, a cup in each hand, one of the young men stared blearily up. “I challenge you – I will drink two cups for each one of yours!”
Forthred, who could sober up almost instantaneously when necessary, pushed himself to his feet, to the cheers of the hall.
“You’d need to, Bosa, to fill the empty space under your hair!”
The men cheered and Bosa, not yet too drunk to realize he had been beaten in a contest of wit, drew further cheers himself by draining, one after the other, the two cups he was holding and then staggering unsteadily but just about successfully back to his seat in the hall.
As the men settled down to the drinking and talking and singing that could linger long into the night, and the servants replaced torches and refilled cups, Edwin called his chief thegns and counsellors around him.
“Rædwald is dead. His son, his surviving son, is not the warrior Rædwald was and he will need my support to keep his crown. The price of that support will be Eorpwald recognizing me as his overlord. The Mercians have no strong king, for Cearl, my father-in-law, is old now and few men make their way to his household. The West Saxons and the East Saxons may fight for lordship of the Saxons between themselves – we shall treat with whomsoever is triumphant. Of the kingdoms of the Britons we need take little account – our forefathers drove them from this land and they remain weak and divided, lesser men than us. That leaves Kent.”
Edwin looked around his assembled men. These were the men he had campaigned with; a few had gone with him into exile and returned, after Æthelfrith’s death, to reclaim their rightful place at the king’s side. Others had served Æthelfrith once, but they served him now, and faithfully. With these men he had conquered the marsh-hidden kingdom of Lindsey, loading his warband upon shallow-bottomed boats and poling them across rivers and swamps until they came, unawares and unexpected, upon King Cædbæd and his meagre band of retainers. The king, choosing discretion, opted to sue for vassalage and Edwin had gladly accepted, taking as gift many slaves, an extraordinary amount of gold and silver, and more preserved eels than their noses could endure through a long, hot and weary journey home.
Guthlaf the warmaster spoke. “Kent is strong, but not as strong as us. However, should Kent make alliance with the East Angles, or the Saxons of West or East, it would match us.”
Edwin looked around his counsellors. By their assents they said they agreed with the words of the warmaster.
“Although they are Britons, we should not forget Gwynedd either,” said Forthred. “Their king, Cadwallon, is a bold warrior and he has put new fire into their cold hearts.”
“No, I know Cadwallon of old,” said Edwin. “We can forget him.”
Forthred looked steadily at Edwin. “Are you sure, my lord?”
“Yes,” said Edwin. “There is nothing to fear from Cadwallon. When I was at his father’s court, he was ever the lesser between us. He will not rise against me.”
“Very well,” said Forthred. “Then that leaves Kent.”
“Yes,” said Edwin. He looked around his men. “It is time I took another wife.”
Chapter 4
“You know how I persuaded the queen that we should travel by land to her new kingdom, to learn more of this stran
ge country, rather than travelling more swiftly by boat?” Paulinus – an Italian, a priest, a missionary and a stranger in a strange land – turned to his companion. James was a fellow Italian, a deacon and another shivering visitor to a place where it seemed summer never came. A red nose emerged from the cloak that James held over his head and shoulders in an attempt to deflect the wind blowing from the north, over the sheet silver meres that paced east alongside the North Road.
“Dess, I remember you explaining dhat to King Eadbald,” said James in a voice remarkably clear of reproach, although stuffed full of catarrh.
“I think I may have made a mistake.”
The wagon was stuck. That in itself was not so unusual, as the Great North Road had decayed in many places to stretches of rubble-strewn ruts, which the wagoners had to relay or haul past before the procession of vehicles, horses and men could get moving again. But this time the wagoners were standing around in a talking, head-scratching group that gave no indication of digging, laying or any other activity. Paulinus tried to see into the wagon ahead, where Queen Æthelburh travelled with her maids, but the rear flaps were closed against the wind. Of course, that was no guarantee that the queen was within the carriage – Æthelburh was as skilled on a horse as most men and just as likely to be riding alongside the bridal procession on her milk-white mare as jolting along in her wagon. Besides, she had told Paulinus during one of their camps, she found the odour of the plodding oxen that pulled the wagons too ripe – she preferred the warm smell of horseflesh. However, her horse was standing patiently by her wagon, so the queen was most likely within. This was proved a moment later when Paulinus saw her head rise up over the top of the wagon – Æthelburh was standing on the driver’s bench.
“What is wrong?” she called out to the wagoners.
The group fractured and one of the wagoners came back to the queen’s wagon. “There’s a river ahead, my lady, and we are not sure if we can ford it.”
“Send a man through it on horseback. If he can ford it, then so can we.” As the wagoner scurried back towards the ford, the queen saw Paulinus watching her, and a smile flashed across her face. “You wanted to see more of my country, father,” she said. “It seems that God has heard your prayer.”
“No,” said Paulinus, wagging his finger, “you must not take the Lord’s name in vain – it is one of the great commandments. Surely I have taught you this?”
“Of course you have, father,” the queen laughed, quite irrepressible in her good humour, and Paulinus reminded himself that she was little more than a girl still, although also a queen of some fifteen years. “Although you are not the only one to have taught me,” she added, her eyes flashing with the mischief of a hinted secret. “But please, come and talk with me. I have heard enough gossip from my women as to what sort of man my husband will be.”
Paulinus scrambled down from the wagon, while James wrapped his cloak more tightly around his body, seeking refuge from the wind.
“In principio creavit Deus caelum et terram…”
Slowing to a stop, Paulinus looked up in wonder as the opening words of the Bible flowed out into the cool, clear air, sung in the chanting mode that he remembered all too clearly from his childhood and youth in Italy, but had not hoped to hear in this barbarian land.
“…terra autem erat inanis et vacua et tenebrae super faciem abyssi et spiritus Dei ferebatur super aquas…”
The voice was high, clear and pure, and indubitably female. Paulinus stared in wonder at the queen as she looked into the distance, chanting in the Roman style.
“…dixitque Deus fiat lux et facta est lux.”
But as Æthelburh drew to the end of the third verse, and the first act of creation, her gaze dropped to the watching, slack-jawed priest, and laughter overcame her.
“H-how do you know…?” began Paulinus.
“Latin? My mother taught me.” Æthelburh beamed down at the priest.
“No, no, I meant, how did you learn the Roman way of singing?”
Æthelburh laughed again. “Brother James has been teaching me, and what with this journey taking so long, I have had much time to practise, have I not, James?” The queen cast a sparkling glance at the deacon, who blushed to the roots of his tonsured hair. Paulinus looked at James, and the deacon blushed even redder. But Æthelburh saw his reproof.
“Don’t scold Brother James, father, and don’t worry that any occasion of scandal might arise from it, for we were at all times accompanied by my maids – who are learning the Roman way of singing too by the way, so that I might sing the Office with them. As we are going into a pagan land, we must needs allow them to hear the beauty of our faith, father, for it was the song of the monks in Canterbury, at St Peter’s, that first pierced my soul when I was a child.”
Brother James gave a quick, grateful smile to the queen, entirely missed by Paulinus, and withdrew into the safety of his hood. The priest, nonplussed, scratched his nose and searched for inspiration on the horizon. Which was why he was the first to see the glint and flicker of light striking polished metal.
“My lady, you’re higher and your eyes are young and sharp. What do you see over there?”
The queen looked, then stood up, shading her eyes.
“Oslac!” she called and the thegn in charge of the men guarding the bridal party came trotting over on his skewbald pony. “There,” she pointed. “I think we may be in trouble.”
The time it had taken Oslac to reach her had brought the glints closer and now Paulinus could see what was sparking the light: men on horseback, the sun catching their armour, their helmets and most of all their upraised spears.
“How many?” Paulinus shouted to James, for the younger man had the sharpest eyes of anyone in the bridal party. Throwing back his hood, James stood and, lips moving silently, began counting. While he did so, Oslac screamed at the wagoners to draw the wagons close together, and called his men to form up in line, ready for battle.
Paulinus looked up at James. “Well?”
The deacon, his face suddenly drained of its blush, looked down. “Too many,” he said.
Æthelburh looked down at Paulinus, and her face, which before had been so clear, was now grim. “Your curiosity may be about to cost us all our lives, father.” Before an open-mouthed Paulinus could frame an answer, the queen had gathered her ladies into her wagon while the wagoners urged the labouring teams of oxen closer.
The priest watched the riders approach. Their horses were bigger than the ones he had seen employed before in Britain, and there was a strangeness to the warriors that he found hard to identify, although as they came closer he saw that rather than the blond and brown hair worn by most of the Angles and Saxons he had seen, these men were mostly dark, their white skins made all the paler by their black hair. They were now close enough for him to count too, but there was no need. A glance was enough to see the truth of what James had said: there were too many of them. This was no raiding party, but a full-scale warband out for plunder, conquest and slaves. Paulinus thought ruefully of the gifts Eadbald had laden upon them to ensure Edwin’s support for his kingship. Such riches were the stuff of a war party’s dreams. As for him and his brother deacon, there was little chance of survival at the hands of pagans – the best they could hope for was to be sold as slaves.
Brother James touched him on the arm.
“Today we will be with the Lord in paradise,” he said simply.
“If we are, then our mission will have failed and the queen will be dead or in bondage. And I will have to answer for her death to God.” Paulinus shivered with dread. And although he tried to pray, the words stuttered on his tongue and in his mouth, for he could not tear his eyes from the display of barbarian savagery he was witnessing. The advancing riders, trotting across the rough pastureland that lay west of the road, were coming towards them two abreast, and each man carried a spear in his right hand, tip afire
in the slanting sunlight, while his shield was held on his left. These shields were different from those Paulinus had seen in this savage land, for the Angles and the Saxons and the men of Kent favoured round shields, painted in rude, flowing patterns, with a central protruding iron boss that could be used as a weapon in the heaving, sweating scrum of a shieldwall. But the riders had curved rectangular shields, more like the devices he knew from his homeland, and while they too were painted, the devices he saw were not all strange, for some seemed like rough representations of the Chi Rho, the first two letters of Christ superimposed upon each other, and others suggested attempts by the unlettered or the uncouth to write Greek letters, such as alpha and omega.
Æthelburh, looking from her wagon, saw the shields too and a sudden, swift surmise filled her.
“Pray!” she shouted to the two watching Italians, and when she saw that they could not understand the English word amid the hubbub, she shouted, “Ora!” before turning to her own women and leading them in chanting psalms.
Paulinus shook himself out of his trance.
“Pray, Brother James; pray as hard as you have ever prayed, that this day the red crown of martyrdom is not placed on our heads.”
Brother James fell to his knees, and his voice, an incongruously beautiful baritone in the desperate circumstances, became the foundation upon which the higher voices of the women built towers of prayer, reaching up to the sky. The riders, rather than advancing upon the bridal party, abruptly began to peel apart, forming a line that now ran parallel to the road and, once all the riders were in line, the horsemen stopped and turned their beasts to face the wagons. The sun, riding low into the west, shadowed the riders’ faces, but now it was clear just how gravely the bridal party was outmanned.
And there the riders waited.
Oslac strode out from the wagons into the neutral ground between the two groups.
From the riders, a single horseman walked his beast forward. Even to Paulinus’s untutored eyes, it was clear this man was the leader of the riders, for he wore a helmet richly patterned in gold, with a scarlet crest riding over its crown in the manner of soldiers of the emperors of old, and his shield was patterned in gold too.
Edwin Page 6