by Justin Hill
‘I shall provide six ships,’ Wulfnoth boasted. ‘If I can find enough men to crew them!’
‘That is a proud boast,’ Gytha said.
Wulfnoth laughed. ‘Only the hollow man boasts. I say what shall be! Let God Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth, be my witness.’
The idea of the fleet excited men. This would work; they would never fear for folk and food, never endure Dane’s Rule again.
Wulfnoth was optimistic, and the year ended well, for it was said that the king had heard of the exploits of the Sudsexe thegn Wulfnoth Cild. Hemming had become a trusted member of the household, and now he had a silver ring on his arm and a sword at his belt, and there was no man more loyal or meek, for he always sat at the far end of the benches and slept furthest from the hearth.
The winter passed, but with spring came rumours that another Army was gathering in the islands and inlets and earth-castles of Sealand and Danemark.
‘How many ships?’
‘Two hundred,’ the seafarers said. Wulfnoth laughed at the number.
Throughout Lent they fasted on bread and herbs and water, processed barefoot to the church. Godwin alone rang the church bell now. The same priest arrived and left his sword at the chapel door and then the service began with the Kyrie eleison, a list of Christ and his Saints, and then they sang Psalm 3. Godwin learnt it off by heart, and with the thought of a vast ship Army arriving, the words were very real to him:
Lord, how are they increased that trouble me!
Many are they that rise up against me …
Arise, O Lord; save me, O my God:
For Thou hast smitten all mine enemies upon the cheekbone;
Thou hast broken the teeth of the ungodly.
Wulfnoth put his faith in steel and courage. He rode up and down the neighbouring valleys picking out the biggest lads, bright enough to make good warriors. The first thing they had to learn was how to hold a spear and shield. Second was their foot play, and most important they had to learn the shieldwall, where each man stood shoulder to shoulder, shields overlapping, a wall to the enemy: a spear hedge, a shieldburg, a rocky and defiant shore for the Army to dash themselves upon.
‘Hold that shield up!’ Beorn ordered. ‘Think about you and the man that stands next to you. A mail shirt is only as strong as the weakest link.’
‘What’s the point of learning to fight?’ one of the lads muttered to the man next to him. ‘If Ethelred leads us, perhaps we should learn how to turn and run faster than the men about us!’
Wulfnoth heard that last man speak and knocked him flat, sent him home in shame.
His nostrils flared with anger as he turned and glared at the rest of the men. ‘Who else wants to go home?’
No one moved. Wulfnoth slapped one lad who was slouching. ‘Stand tall! Stand proud!’
The new recruits braced themselves together as a shieldwall as Wulfnoth and Beorn and Caerl and Hemming took wood axes. The first charge bounced off but they charged again and hammered their shields, turned and kicked and thrust and kneed. The shieldwall held – just – and Wulfnoth seemed content.
‘Better,’ he said. ‘Now, see those grain sacks? One under each arm and run round the lone hazel!’
The lone hazel grew halfway up the far side of the valley. Hardly any of them could manage to carry the sacks without dropping them, but Wulfnoth did, and jogged past them, sweat dripping from his nose and chin.
‘Again!’ he said when the last stumbled home. ‘Come on! Do you think the Army is sitting at home and picking their noses? No! They’re rowing to England and they’re dreaming of splitting your dumb skulls!’
It was nearing Lent when Wulfnoth took Godwin down to the coast. The shipyards stretched as far as they could see. Nail-workers beat out flat-headed nails, and painters were mixing great copper cauldrons of stinking colours, and there she was, a sixty-four-oared craft, six rods long from end to end, a raised platform at the front where spearmen and archers could stand.
Wulfnoth swung down from the saddle.
‘Look at this!’ he said. ‘My new ship. She’s a fine craft, is she not?’ He ran a hand lovingly down her clinker planks. ‘Her name is Swanneck. Sixty-four oars, the longest keel we could find, and just look how lean she is!’
There was a delight in his father’s gaze as he stood back. It was as if he saw the ship filled with warriors, and himself at the prow, ready to leap into the enemy’s midst.
Swanneck was a warship through and through. Her lean, low, arrow-thin design was built for speed, not cargo; she was the finest ship on the Boseham strand: lean like a hunter.
That evening the wind sharpened, brought angry waves up from the deep. Wulfnoth stood, dark against the westering sunlight. He spent a long time staring out to the horizon. The sun began to set; the sky was a pale lavender; the sea shifted in colour, dark and gloomy and uneasy.
‘What is he looking for?’ Godwin asked.
Caerl said, ‘Pirate sails.’
‘And how will he know one square sail from another?’
Caerl laughed. ‘That I do not know, but I have learnt to trust your father when he smells a pirate.’
A week later when the winds turned to the east and Wulfnoth spotted three sails skimming the horizon. He shinned up a tree to get a better look. They were Norse ships with square sails, stiff with the brisk tailing wind, loping over the waves like a pack of hounds. They were too sleek to be merchants, he thought, too close to be heading for Burgenda land.
He sent Godwin up into the tree to keep watch as they crossed the horizon. For a long time they drifted along the coast, but when the sun began westering they tacked sharply towards shore.
Wulfnoth caught a branch and swung himself up.
They were warships and he saw the glint of steel flashing in the sunlight.
‘That’s it!’ Wulfnoth said, and jumped up. ‘To sea!’
Swanneck was still only half painted, but she slid into the waves and her eager timbers were buoyed up.
It was a rough day and Godwin held fast to the mast as the ship nosed out of the estuary. He was eleven and this was to be his first battle. He would brag about it later, as men bragged about the first girl they bedded. Godwin checked his sword was loose in its sheath, went through everything he could remember about war and battle. The men about him had the air of huntsmen on a morning jaunt. Each thrust of the oars lurched the prow forward, swan-flapping low over the water, the banks of oars rising and falling like wings. Godwin looked behind and saw the foaming wake widen behind them as the land grew more distant.
They cleared the headland and Godwin felt the breeze on his face. It smelt of salt and seaweed, and a young lad’s first battle. The wind on his cheeks settled his roiling gut. Godwin let out a tentative belch, but no puke came, so he let out another, and took in a deep breath.
‘They are making for Wiht!’ the lookout called, but just looking up at the lad, swinging back and forth from the mast top, made Godwin’s stomach lurch. The wind was driving the waves onto shore, and as it grew in strength the boat began to roll and pitch and the seasickness came all of a sudden with a cold sweat and a mouth full of spit.
‘I see them!’ the lookout called out, and Godwin clutched the mast and let out another belch, which failed to take away the awful feeling in his stomach. ‘Three furlongs off. Square sails!’
‘Come!’ Wulfnoth said to Godwin as he strode past. Godwin made the mistake of leaving the mast, and before he had got to the end of the boat the cold sweat spread from his back to his hands, and he knew he was going to be sick. He wished, like the dying man wishes for death, that it would just come and be done.
‘Look!’ Wulfnoth said and Godwin tried to listen as his father pointed out the dim shadows breaking through the mists, but he puked over the side and the spit flew back up at him and then sailed along the side of the boat and caught Beorn in the face.
Beorn smiled his crooked smile, wiped it off and gently patted Godwin’s back.
‘We
shouldn’t have brought him,’ Hemming said. ‘He is too young for sea battle.’
Beorn said nothing, but Hemming came over and put his hand on Godwin’s back.
Godwin vomited three more times. They were loud retches, with nothing left to bring up. Wulfnoth didn’t pause, and Godwin stood up and wiped his mouth, and thought that he had shamed his father, but he could see that the men about him were smiling.
‘That’s it – get it all out,’ one man said. ‘It’s better than shitting yourself!’
Godwin tried to make it back to the mast, but the sickness overcame him and the men about him groaned and shoved him towards the side of the boat.
‘Keep to the edge!’ one of the men told him, and Godwin leant over the side and stared down into the water, and wished he had been left ashore. There was a fathom of clear green water before the light-shafts faded. He broke the surface with his fingers and the tomb-cold touch made his stomach feel better, but with each roll the wave-crest skimmed along the side of the boat. Godwin felt sure that the next wave would swamp them and wanted to warn someone, but could not open his mouth.
Fear had cold and numbing talons, and each grip left him more and more miserable. Bit by bit the Norse ships plunged closer.
‘They think they can outpace us,’ Hemming called.
‘Faster!’ Wulfnoth ordered, but Swanneck was not sailing; swan-skimming, she barely touched the water while the other four ships butted each wave and fell behind, and poor Seawolf looked like a lumbering old hound as she tried to keep up with the sleek sprinter.
The first Norse boat was a light craft of forty oars, with a red-and-black striped sail that bellied out with the gathering breeze. The next was a lean wave-cutter, with white sail silhouetting the shaven-headed warrior at the prow. The third was the largest and slowest – butting the waves rather than slicing through them. Silver fish leapt to safety from their cutting prows, rising and falling in flashing shoals like the flight of many arrows.
‘Larboard a little!’ Wulfnoth shouted. ‘Larboard!’ he shouted again and waved frantically, but the day was waning and the tide had gone too far out, the water was too shallow for them to cross the sand-banks. Swanneck slowed as her keel grated on the bottom, and then stopped.
‘Damn!’ Wulfnoth cursed. ‘Back!’
They pushed and heaved. Godwin scooped up a mouthful of seawater and spat out the taste of vomit as his father stamped up and down the boat, shouting orders as he swung himself under the rigging.
‘Are we going to go back to land?’ Godwin asked hopefully.
Beorn sniffed and wrinkled his nose. ‘No. It will not be long until the bore sweeps round the other side of the isle and lifts us again.’
‘Will there be a battle?’
‘Let us hope so!’
Godwin did not share his enthusiasm. The sagas never spoke of sea-sickness, and he did not want to go to his grave feeling like this. Come on, Godwin, he told himself. Only a fool feels no fear, and even fish fear the sea.
Wulfnoth looked over the side of the boat and back to land to check his bearings. He spotted his son and saw him for what he was – a boy among men – and felt a moment’s indecision. The Norsemen jeered; he turned to face them and grinned. Wulfnoth smelt the air, for the wind was shifting.
The Soluente was a treacherous water, but it wasn’t Wulfnoth who had been betrayed; it was the hope of the Norsemen. There were two tides here; as they lapped about the Wiht he could see the bore making its way towards them.
‘Ready your oars!’ he shouted, and with one hand on the rigging he swung himself over the side of the boat to check one more time, then called the first oar strike. ‘But gently. Save some strength for killing!’
‘Not long now,’ Hemming said a short while later as he worked his oar and Swanneck broke over the sand banks. The Norse captains shouted to each other in alarm.
Wulfnoth put his lips to his horn and blew a great blast. It rang out from the watching hills and headlands and weed-strewn rocks as if there was a host of warriors, and despite his misery, it stirred something within Godwin – hard and brave and warlike – and with a low grunt all as one the men about him bent to their oars. Wulfnoth’s four remaining ships had turned round the sandbank, where the channel ran deeper, but foam-throated Swanneck cut the green seawater, the banks of oars flapping her forwards, swooping on her prey as the gyrfalcon strikes.
Hemming peered over his shoulder. ‘Keep to the mast,’ he told Godwin.
Godwin nodded, but the warlike spirit that had entered him. He drew his sword, stood by the oarsmen, gripped his shield. Now they were sailing into the waves, the roll and pitch had gone and the boat skimmed forward.
‘They will not make it!’ Wulfnoth called out.
The first two ships were too far ahead. They were turning to try and help the third, but Wulfnoth laughed. He had waited hours – no, years – for this moment. ‘We have them!’ He laughed, and Godwin smiled with him and the boat lurched forwards. As the battle-joy coursed through him, Godwin saw the crew upon the last Norse boat. The captain was a fine-looking man with black hair, tight-meshed mail and gold rings. He marched up and down, shouting as Wulfnoth had done, and they furled their sails and looked to their weapons.
Wulfnoth waved his spear to the other boats. ‘Faster,’ he roared to the oarsmen, ‘lest we have to share the glory!’
They can see that they will die, Godwin thought as the distance between them shortened to half a furlong, but still they ready themselves for battle. They have chosen a good ending.
Wulfnoth turned and saw Godwin behind him. ‘Back to the mast,’ he shouted, ‘and stay there!’
But he did not stop to see if his son did as he was told, and Godwin stood in the prow and stared out at the doomed pirates. Their ship was wallowing in the water, and a few of the crew had taken their oars out to ward off Swanneck, while the captain – handsome in his war-rings – brandished his war spear.
‘Bring us alongside!’ Wulfnoth called, and Swanneck lurched as Caerl pushed on the steer board.
The men dropped their oars and leapt up, seizing shields and weapons. The bravest rushed to the gunwales, while others stayed in the middle to balance the boat, but still Swanneck rocked violently and Godwin put his hand out to steady himself and feared for a moment that they would be swamped with cold, green water.
The Norses had a few archers and arrows flew between the boats. One of the men from Contone fell back with a grunt, a Norse barb buried in his gut. The air between the boats was thick with missiles. A hammer blow struck Godwin and he tripped backwards over a sea chest and banged his head. He felt hands under his armpits dragging him to safety as the grappling ropes began to clatter and thud, and the narrowing gap of green sea became frantic with leaping fish and confused waves.
Wulfnoth was the first to leap across and he landed on his feet, felt his shield buckle under the weight of spear-thrusts that would have killed an unarmed man. He struck left and right, slammed his ruined shield into an ugly Norse’s face, splattering the man’s nose across his cheek with the steel boss, then tossed the ruined shield aside and rammed his spear blade into the mouth of a barefoot pirate. He saw it come out of the back of his head before the man jerked backwards and fell down, his heels drumming the deck as Wulfnoth roared over him. It was death to lose your footing in a sea battle, and Wulfnoth danced as the ships rocked and pitched with each swell.
The first warrior behind Wulfnoth was the son of Contone’s blacksmith, Unferth. As he leapt across the gap a throwing axe caught him on the side of the head, his head spun round, his back teeth flew out in an arc and he crashed to the floor like a stunned ox. He almost knocked Beorn over as he took his death-leap into the enemy boat and felt a spear point graze up his left arm, his right hand jar as his sword blade clanged tunelessly on an iron helmet.
The battle was a blur. Only Caerl saw things clearly as he stood at the stern, grasping the steer board till the two ships were grappled together like knife fighters i
n a death grip. Both crews leapt into the other’s boat. Caerl used a spear to fend off one hairy Dane. He had black hair and smouldering blue eyes, huge forearms from a life at sea and a thick sword that he used to hack at the ash spear shaft. The wood split in two and the Dane laughed as he raised his sword to murder Caerl.
The brute tripped on a grappling rope and Caerl took his chance and leapt up into him. It was knife work then. The Dane went for Caerl’s eyes and Caerl groaned and whipped his head back and forth while he struggled to get his eating knife free. It came out at last, and Caerl had one of the man’s hands locked in his teeth as he lifted the Dane’s mail shirt, found the soft spot under the belt and drove the blade in. Caerl kept pushing deeper till the fiend stopped twitching, and only then did he spit the hairy hand out of his mouth and stagger to his feet.
It was short and bloody and brutal, and it was almost over before the second craft arrived, crashing into the paired boats, shattering her own steer board in her helmsman’s eagerness. Only the Norse captain, unwounded in his coat of fine mail, remained. Wulfnoth strode towards him meaning to offer him a clean death, but the man denied him that, leapt over the dead and the dying and, with a great bound, hurled himself over the side. Arms wide like a crane suddenly launching itself from a high branch, he hung there for a moment, mouth open, laughing at death.
‘Odin!’ he shouted, and hit the water like a stone. Wulfnoth tried to grab him but he sank in an instant with a horrible sucking sound, as if the sea had swallowed him. Wulfnoth stared down; all that remained were a brief ripple of black water and a few bubbles that troubled the surface, and were gone.
Wulfnoth lost seven men in the fight, and another who slipped on the gunwales and sank into the waves before anyone could grab him. He was a cheerful lad named Osgod who was good at the harp and left a mother and wife with a pair of twins to care for.