Uhtred the Bold

by H A CULLEY

  ‘They are all Scots,’ Sigurd said blandly.

  I doubted that very much. Some might be as no doubt the Vikings had done a little raiding on their way south along the coast, but most would be from Deira. However, I couldn’t call him a liar openly.

  ‘Nevertheless you will release them. I have a treaty with the King of Scots.’

  That gave Sigurd pause for thought. He might decide to defy me, but Kenneth was trying to recover Caithness and Sutherland. If I brought the armies of Northumbria north to help him it was probable that we could defeat him. However, taking the Northumbrians all the way up to northern tip of Britain was as likely as snow on a hot day in August. For a start my father would never agree to my leading the men of Bernicia anywhere, and I doubted that the rest would want to leave their homes to fight so far away. However, Sigurd couldn’t be certain of that.

  ‘Very well, we will release them and send them across to you. Let’s get on with this.’

  And it was as simple as that. Whilst the banks were slippery and men on foot who tried to cross would keep sliding back down into the water, horses found it easier to climb the soft mud. Ulfric rode across with Wulfstan and he administered the oath, then they returned with Sigurd’s pretend son on the back of Ulfric’s horse. I rode across with fifty mounted warriors and followed the Vikings back to where the fleet was beached.

  The captives were released and Sigurd and his men departed without another word being spoken. I heard later that he had raided the coast north of the Forth and no doubt replenished their supply of thralls to make up for those I had persuaded him to leave behind. I never met him again.

  Naturally both the Danes and Angles of Deira were ecstatic about their bloodless victory over the Norsemen, as they saw it, and, as I had hoped, it served to bond them together again, at least for now.

  As I suspected, the boy was indeed a thrall. He was a Pict from Caithness called Uuen, the rest of whose family had been killed when Sigurd attacked their village. He protested and fought like a tiger when my men stripped him and washed his filthy body in the River Ouse but I allowed him to keep his thick woollen tunic and leggings, rich though they were and far too good for a servant. He was grateful for that and, when I gave him a choice: become a swineherd, his occupation whilst a thrall of the Norsemen, or serve me as my new body servant, he had the sense to choose the latter.

  Chapter Eleven - The Battle of Monzievaird

  1004 -05

  I was out riding with my son when the summons came. Aldred was now seven and was a more than competent rider of the pony I’d bought him for his last birthday. We’d raced back home and, although I had given him a head start, he managed to gallop in through the gates in the palisade, whooping with delight, just ahead of me.

  As I handed my sweaty horse over to a stable boy to unsaddle and rub down, Ecgfrida came out of the door to the hall.

  ‘The king has sent a letter,’ she told me without preamble, wringing her hands in dismay.

  I knew immediately that it wasn’t good news. King Æthelred’s foolish collusion in the massacre of the Danes in 1002 continued to haunt him. Sweyn Forkbeard, King of Denmark and Norway, had ravaged the Wessex coastline in 1003 and then returned to invade eastern England the following year. The Earl of East Anglia, Leofsige, had raised the fyrd to oppose the invasion by Sweyn and his Danes but Leofsige had been killed and his army routed near Bury St. Edmund’s, leaving the east of England undefended.

  The letter said that Æthelred was gathering a mighty host to drive Sweyn out of England for once and all. The king ordered me to gather as many men from Northumbria as I could and bring them to Nottingham. I was to meet the muster from Mercia there and he would join us as soon as he could with the men of Wessex.

  I showed the king’s letter to Leland.

  ‘The man’s mad,’ he scoffed. ‘The Danes of Deira haven’t forgiven him for the Saint Brice’s Day massacre and, in any case, they are hardly likely to be reliable allies against other Danes. I can’t see your father letting you take the Bernician fyrd anywhere either, and the men of Lothian are needed here.’

  He was right. The last reports I had of Kenneth indicated that he and Malcolm, his putative heir, had fallen out. The story I heard was that Kenneth had changed his mind and had now made his fourteen year old son, Giric, his heir. The rumour wasn’t exactly correct. A few weeks later I learned that Giric had been installed as co-ruler with his father. Presumably Kenneth thought that this would ensure a smooth transition of the throne from father to son when the time came. Predictably Malcolm had been incandescent with rage. He denounced Kenneth as foresworn and a traitor, and set about trying to instigate a rebellion amongst the mormaers. I would much rather have Giric as King of Scots than Malcolm, but he was too young to command that much support north of the border.

  ‘What will you do?’ Ecgfrida asked me when we were alone.

  It had been a long time since we had shared a bed but we were still close and had no secrets from each other now, at least not on my side. Not only were we good friends but increasingly I relied on her advice on important matters. She had never let me forget the risk I’d run in going to Orkney and making a pact with Sigurd the Stout. Ever since then I’d confided in her before making important decisions.

  ‘I’ll have to make it clear to the king that his northern border is too volatile to strip it of fighting men at the moment.’

  ‘He may never forgive you if you desert him in his time of need,’ she pointed out.

  ‘It’s a risk I’ll have to take. My duty is to Northumbria. Æthelred’s writ barely runs up here anyway.’

  The reply was duly sent and I heard nothing further that year. As it turned out there was no pitched battle between the armies of Sweyn and Æthelred. When the latter advanced into eastern England he found the place a wasteland with nothing left of the towns and villages except charred timbers, but no Danes opposed him.

  It transpired that, whilst that summer was warm and relatively dry in England, it had never stopped raining in Denmark and the harvest had been ruined. The population was in danger of starving during the coming winter and there was general unrest at Sweyn’s absence. He had little option but to return home in haste.

  That winter was another harsh one and everyone, Malcolm included, was too busy ensuring that most of his people survived to cause much mischief. Our grain stores were full, the livestock well protected against hungry packs of wolves, the rafters of my hall were hung with smoked meat, and the piles of cut wood would see us through the cold days and nights ahead. We settled down for a comfortable, if dull, winter.

  It wasn’t until the middle of January that the snows came. It had been bitterly cold from early December onwards but the daytime skies were blue and those at night twinkled with stars. Of course the absence of cloud cover meant that the frosts were severe and the ice often didn’t melt from one day to the next. The ground was frozen solid and that meant that travel, though unpleasant was feasible with care.

  Apart from riding around the outlying hamlets and down to Carham and Norham to see that everyone was alright, I didn’t stray very far. However, travellers came to us from time to time. We heard the worst of tidings from a mendicant friar who was returning to his mother house in York and begged a night’s rest with us. It was our duty to help and give him food as well as a bed for the night. In return he was a fund of gossip.

  ‘I saw no signs of preparation for war, but that was hardly surprising in this weather,’ he confided in a hoarse whisper that could heard a hundred yards away. ‘But there was talk of it in the air everywhere I went north of the Forth.

  ‘Malcom is supported by the Mormaers of Fife, Angus and Perth whereas the others, including Hacca of Edinburgh, support Kenneth and Giric, or so it is rumoured.’

  ‘That would give Kenneth numerical superiority, wouldn’t it?’ I asked him.

  ‘I’m not a military man, far from it, but it is also said that Owain ap Dyfnwal of Strathclyde will change his allegi
ance to Malcolm once battle is joined.’

  ‘You mean he will turn his coat on the battlefield and stab Kenneth in the back?’ I asked, aghast.

  ‘That’s what I just said, isn’t it?’ he asked peevishly.

  ‘We must stop him,’ I said decisively, though I had no idea how I could do that.

  ~~~

  Hacca was pleased, but somewhat surprised, to see me when I arrived at his stronghold of Edinburgh. Over a tankard of mead I told him what the friar had told me.

  ‘Yes, it’s only too true, I fear,’ he confirmed with a sigh. ‘Kenneth is gathering his forces in the south before marching north to confront Malcolm. I am ordered to join the king’s muster at Dunblane. That’s where Owain and the men of Strathclyde will join us.’

  I hadn’t mentioned what the friar had said about Owain being ready to betray Kenneth up to now and I debated whether I should confide in him. I decided to try an oblique approach.

  ‘Have you heard any rumours about Owain?’

  Hacca shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

  ‘I don’t listen to gossip,’ he said a trifle stiffly.

  ‘Then you should. At the very least they provide a line of enquiry to follow up. You’ll learn that the key to survival is often knowing more than the next man.’

  He looked unconvinced but admitted that he’d heard stories that Owain had been in secret negotiations with Malcolm.

  ‘I don’t give them much credence. If Owain became an oath breaker then he would be despised by all honest men.’

  ‘Perhaps what Malcolm has promised him will make the disapproval of his inferiors unimportant in comparison?’

  Hacca sat lost in thought for a moment.

  ‘What are you suggesting?’ he asked at long last.

  ‘That we harry and delay Owain’s army so that he arrives too late to take part in the battle. By that I mean raids on his baggage train; attacks by my horsemen to force his men to deploy, followed by a quick withdrawal; night attacks on his camp; that sort of thing.’

  ‘But supposing these rumours are false and that Owain intends to aid Kenneth and Geric?’

  I shrugged. ‘The Britons are a threat to Lothian anyway, so I won’t lose any sleep over killing a few of them.’

  ‘You say that that you need my help but I am duty bound to answer the summons to Dunblane.’

  ‘Do we know where Malcolm is at the moment?’

  ‘The last I heard he was still gathering his forces in Angus.’

  ‘If Owain is mustering his men at Dumbarton, and I’ve sent scouts out to verify that, then I’d expect him to take the road from there to Stirling, cross the River Forth, and then head north to Dunblane. If you lend me your household warriors, preferably mounted, you can still head for Dunblane with your fyrd.’

  Hacca still looked dubious and so I added: ‘Your warriors can join you there, or follow you if Kenneth has already left to confront Malcolm. I need men who can fight well and move swiftly for my plan to work and, being mounted, they will easily catch a slow moving army up.’

  ‘Very well. I’ll let you have twenty horsemen. How many will that give you in total?’

  ‘About a hundred. It’s nothing like the numbers Owain will have in his army, but it should be enough for what I intend.’

  In fact, when the scouts returned to confirm that the Strathclyde Britons were mustering at Dumbarton, they estimated the numbers already there at fifteen hundred.

  ~~~

  Owain’s Britons had halted for the night beside Endrick Water, a river which ran from its confluence with the River Carron to Loch Lommond. They evidently felt safe within their own lands and didn’t bother to put out any piquets. The only sentries we could see were at the horse lines and outside King Owain’s tent. Most of the Britons slept in the open, only the chieftains and nobles having tents. That made our task simpler.

  The night was chilly, as you might expect for the middle of March in the Scottish glens, and there was a light frost on the ground, illuminated by the full moon above. It meant that each group kept their campfire banked up to provide a little warmth, although only those closest to the fire would really get much benefit. The good news was that it gave us light to see what we were about.

  The signal to move was the hoot of an owl repeated four times in quick succession. It was unlikely to occur in nature but it would arouse less interest than a blast on a horn. We moved forward in a long line which stretched from one side of the camp to another.

  At first we walked our horses and started to methodically spear the sleeping men as they lay on the ground. It wasn’t long before someone saw us and started to shout a warning, but by that time we must have killed the best part of a hundred men. We continued at a walk, thrusting our spears into men as they rose groggily to their feet until someone had the sense to try and organise some form of defence.

  Groups of Britons coalesced into ad hoc groups armed with weapons and shields but we didn’t try to tackle them. I gave the signal and a horn blared out the charge. By this time we were near Owain’s tent and he emerged just as I reached it. I thrust my spear towards his bare chest; had I succeeded in killing him history might have been very different. However, one of the sentries managed to interpose his shield in front of his king and jabbed at me with his own spear.

  Thankfully he was unused to fighting horsemen and he aimed at me instead of my much more vulnerable horse. Had I ended up on foot I would have been either dead or a prisoner. I ducked and the spear went over my left shoulder, scraping a couple of links from my chain mail as it went. I kicked out with my boot and the man went tumbling back into the side of the tent.

  One of my companions had disposed of the other sentry but now several armed warriors were heading our way. Owain had a sword in his hand and he attempted to slash my thigh open. I steered my horse away from the blow with my knees and the sword cut deep into the wooden part of the saddle instead of my flesh. There it stuck fast, much to Owain’s fury as he tried to pull it free.

  I stabbed down wildly with my spear and felt it sink into flesh. I had no ideas how much damage I had done to the king but we were now coming under attack and it was time to go before we lost too many men. I waved frantically at my signaller and he blew the signal to disengage on his horn. Everywhere my men broke off fighting and kicked their heels into their steeds. We galloped through the rest of the camp, scattering men or riding over them if they were too slow to get out of the way.

  We heard the sound of pursuit behind us but we didn’t stop until the ground started to slope upwards towards the hills known as the Campsie Fells. There I discovered that we had lost six men killed or so badly wounded that they had fallen from their horses. Eight others had minor flesh wounds which were washed, sewn up with catgut and bandaged.

  By the time we had done this, and our blown horses had recovered, we could hear the sound of the Britons searching for us. We had scattered their herd of ponies and a few horses as we left the camp so I suspected that our pursuers were on foot. We listened intently and silently Kenric pointed towards a spot three hundred yards away where we could dimly make out a few men as they breasted a ridgeline below us. I quickly counted those I could see and came up with an estimate of about thirty.

  Handing the reins of my horse to Uuen I took a firm grip on my sword and shield and headed downhill on foot, angling to the right of the oncoming Britons. I took seventy men with me, leaving the rest with Uuen and our horses.

  We kept to the shadows as much as possible and moved slowly so as not to alert the Britons to our presence. The skittering of a dislodged stone would sound very loud in the stillness of the night. However, our quarry was making enough noise to hide any inadvertent sounds we might make. Once we were close to the enemy, but still a little above them, I gave a hand signal and we moved into a wedge formation.

  They didn’t know what had hit them. We drove through them like a spear through a straw target, killing and wounding as we went. By the time we’d emerged on the other
side of the group we must have caused over a dozen casualties with no losses to ourselves. Moreover, they were disorganised and demoralised. We turned and attacked the remainder and a melee ensued. The outcome was never in doubt as we outnumbered them quite significantly.

  I was faced by a yelling Briton waving his spear around as if trying to scare me. I batted the point aside with my shield and thrust my sword into his guts. He dropped his spear and clutched his stomach as he dropped to the ground.

  I stepped over him to confront a large man with a double handed axe. Had it struck me neither helmet nor byrnie would have saved me. He raised his axe on high and aimed at my head but I stooped low and to the side. The axe missed my left leg by inches as I drove the point of my sword through his neck. He gurgled and died, spurting blood everywhere.

  It was all over. We had killed thirty two of the Britons and the rest had fled. There were no wounded to worry about because my men slit their throats before stripping the corpses of anything of value, not that there was much, and making our way back up to our horses.

  We camped for the rest of the night further into the hills and slept to recover from out exertions until the sun was high in the sky. As soon as we had had a bite to eat the scouts left to find Owain’s army whilst the rest of us made our way into the Gargunnock Hills north east of the Campsies.

  In the middle of the afternoon the scouts came back to say that the Strathclyde army had only managed to advance five miles after recovering from our night attack. They were now on the flat ground to the south of Flanders Moss. It took us an hour and a half to reach a small village that lay just to the south of the road that Owain was following.

  We waited, hidden from sight but only a few hundred yards from the passing army, until the baggage train came into sight. There were thirty lumbering carts drawn by oxen and filled with everything from food and tents to spare spears and arrows. They were guarded by a hundred men on foot walking beside the carts and a further hundred bringing up the rear.