by Justin Hill
‘We are still alive,’ Godwin said.
Edmund nodded.
‘We are still alive,’ Godwin said.
Edmund looked up. He thought his friend was touched.
Godwin looked at him. ‘Edmund. We are still alive. You are still alive. We met the Danes and we almost beat them. You led the English against the Danes! We would never have believed that when we were young.’
It was true. But not helpful. But Godwin had a light in his eye. ‘Edmund, Knut came here to kill you and break the English. We bloodied his nose and we are still standing. That is a victory!’
Edmund did not feel it.
Godwin kept talking. He stood up and spoke louder and more passionately. ‘Edmund, you proved yourself this day. Those bastards, they have terrorised our childhoods. We met them toe to toe and we shoved them back!’
Godwin’s words did just enough to get Edmund to his feet.
Edmund came out of his wife’s chambers an hour or so later. He still wore his battle clothes, but the blood and gore had been washed from his cheeks and his hair, and his hands were clean, and even though his eyes still looked haunted, he forced a smile, cleared his throat, called for ale and food and a scop to sing to his warriors.
‘I am proud of you all,’ he told them as he paced the benches. He did not feel the words. ‘Every damned soul here! We bloodied Knut’s nose this day, and while we dine in Malmesberie he is still camping out in the fields!’
It was all he could say. He laughed, but his laughter was as humourless as the croak of a rook. ‘I am proud of you all,’ he said, but his voice faded almost to a whisper.
Godwin summoned lads and young men who had not been in the battle.
They looked clean and uncomfortable as they stood before him. They were all conscious of the wounds and bruises on his face, and the clean look of theirs. The men had no idea why Godwin Wulfnothson – the name was now spoken with awe and respect – had called them here.
‘We are riding out,’ Godwin announced. His lips had cracked and as he spoke one of the cracks opened up again. He felt his lip tear and almost enjoyed the brief stab of pain. ‘To raise the war bands again. I want you all to take the fastest horses. Take word to the shires. Edmund beat Knut this day.’
The words came out very clearly. He looked each man in the eye.
‘Thank God! King Edmund beat the Danes this day.’
It took a moment for them to understand what he was demanding of them.
‘You have heard the stories?’
They nodded.
‘Good. Tell all the stories of King Edmund’s valour. Sing his name!’
They got the message.
Godwin leant against the table and rested. The young men bowed and thanked him and began to leave.
‘Have you heard the name that men have given him?’ Godwin called.
The men paused at the door. They looked at each other. They shook their heads.
They reminded Godwin of himself when he was their age. ‘Men are calling him Edmund Ironside. Spread that name. King Edmund Ironside has beaten the Danes! There will be great booty when the final victory comes.’
*
Thorkel and Knut rode to the gates of Malmesberie, but the burg was too stoutly defended, and they did not have the skills or the patience for a siege. Men who had arrived too late for the battle clashed with Eadric’s men and wounded his banner-bearer, and fearing for their plunder, the Danish war chiefs were wary to move out.
‘So Edmund has escaped again,’ Knut said as he looked at the God-created burg of Malmesberie, impregnable with its walls of river and stone. As hard as Edmund, Knut felt the weight of failure pressing down on him again. ‘And the corn is still wet. We cannot ravage land that we have already picked clean.’
Thorkel did not answer.
‘You have nothing to say?’
Thorkel shrugged. ‘I am listening, lord.’
Knut did not like the thinly veiled mockery. He had lost too many men at Sorestone, and that night Knut decided that it was no longer safe to keep the Army divided. ‘It is not safe for us to split our strength now. The rebels are too many. We will return to Lundenburh and finish the siege.’
When Knut returned to Lundenburh, Eric of Hlathir came out on foot to welcome him. He threw a great feast to celebrate Knut’s return. His men ignored the tales of the new English skill in battle and eyed the train of booty that followed Thorkel’s men with unreserved envy.
‘I give you all that I have taken,’ Knut told the unhappy men who followed Eric. ‘How is the White Queen?’
‘She is still riding, though her horse is no longer white.’
‘She’s probably eaten it. So no ships have got in?’
Eric was certain. ‘None, lord.’
Knut nodded. He liked Eric. He had an honest face and manner, and he had birth and breeding, and a long record of winning battles. ‘Bring me the bigger prize of Lundenburh and I shall give you the pick of the plunder.’
Eric’s men manned the ramparts that the Danes had thrown up about Lundenburh, while the others constantly raided for supplies. At first the farmers had given gladly, but as the siege dragged on without conclusion, the farmers had nothing left they could give without starving, and the Danes had to seize it from them by force. They scoured all the land for two days’ ride, and by the time of Knut’s return, his men were forced to send hundreds of men in raiding parties deep into the hostile fringes of Midelsexe and Sudrie. Each day ribbons of smoke smeared the trees of the Temese Valley and beyond. The wooing was a rape.
‘Still no sign of Edmund. Where is he?’ Knut asked Eadric as a raiding party returned.
‘Well, he is not in Mercia,’ Eadric said. ‘I have sealed off the north to him.’
‘East Anglia?’
Eadric shook his head. ‘He will hole himself up in the marshes of Wessex. When Lundenburh falls, no one will follow him.’
‘When Lundenburh falls,’ Knut said, and did not bother turning to look at the rebellious city. ‘When Lundenburh falls!’
Knut thought of the White Queen. When Lundenburh falls, he thought.
Eadric pursed his lips. ‘It cannot be long. The whole country accepts you. The Wincestre mint is already striking coins with your image.’ Eadric held out the shining penny. ‘Here!’ He spun it into the air and Knut caught it. ‘Accept this, the first of many.’
Knut weighed the penny in his palm. When he was a boy, picking in wonder over the mismatched and clipped coins from Middle Earth, it was the English ones that had fascinated him. They were the truest coin and one of his earliest memories was climbing on to his mother’s knee. She wore a necklace of Ethelred coins, each the same weight and thickness and purity of silver.
I want to be king of that country, he thought to himself. And here he was. His face remained expressionless, but inside he was glad.
Knut put the coin away.
‘Make sure the roads are watched,’ he said to Eadric and Thorkel that evening.
In the privacy of his bower, Knut took the coin out again. Edmund had already shown more grit and guts and determination than twenty years of English kings and aldermen. Knut felt he was beginning to understand his enemy and, curiously, to like him.
*
Unbeknown to the Danes, Edmund stayed in Malmesberie to organise the defence of the town and the abbey.
Ealdgyth went into labour three days after the Army had departed. Edmund wanted a sign that he should continue the fight and decided that if God gave him a boy, he still had the Lord’s blessing.
Ealdgyth did not shout or curse. The nuns kept up their prayers as she let out a low and tortured moan as the baby slipped out and all the labour pains lifted – as sudden as an unforeseen victory.
Edmund was with his war chiefs when the thin sound of a newborn’s crying echoed down the stone cloisters. He caught Godwin’s eye, but they all continued as if nothing had happened, but it was hard to concentrate as they heard footsteps hurrying towards them.
A monk entered the room. The messenger faltered.
Edmund snapped at him, ‘Wait!’
The meeting went on for another half-hour. The baby’s crying stopped. Edmund thanked his captains, and they bowed and left. Only Godwin remained.
It was only when all had been finalised that Edmund turned to the monk. ‘Step forward,’ he said.
The monk bowed and came forward, his hands clasped together in prayer.
Edmund feared this moment. He spoke in a low and guarded voice. ‘Tell me.’
The monk bowed again. ‘My lord, England has an heir.’
‘Speak plain. It is a boy?’
‘It is, my lord.’
Edmund turned to face the tapestry. Tears brimmed in his eyes.
God had spoken!
Edmund’s boy was named Edward, ‘Happy Guard’, after Edward the Elder, son of Alfred, who brought Mercia, Exsessa, East Anglia under his rule, and who defeated the Walsh in battle at Farndon, and the Norwegian kings of Euruic at Wodensfeld. Baby Edward was fat and healthy, and busy suckling at the wet nurse’s breast when Edmund first looked on him. Battle shock made his heart heavy, and he looked at the boy and felt – to his surprise – little, other than a deep well of gladness and relief, which bubbled slowly and gently to the surface. When the boy had eaten his fill and slept, the wet nurse carried him to Edmund’s arms. It seemed a strange thing to see a king who still wore the scratches of battle holding such a small and tender life in his arms.
The child had a mop of pale hair and his father’s face, and strong fat arms. ‘Why is he yellow?’ Edmund asked.
The wet nurse spoke gently, as if she feared to wake the babe. ‘It is so with many. He will plump up soon and take your colour.’
‘He would be better to take his mother’s,’ Edmund said.
Edmund did not seem inclined to move, so Godwin sat down next to him.
The wet nurse swaddled the baby up to the chin. There were thin wisps of blond hair on his head and cheeks.
‘He looks strong,’ Godwin said.
The two warriors looked down on the boy. Ealdgyth watched them. The shock seemed to pass from their faces, and they smiled and stroked the baby’s cheek with the backs of their fingers, touched his button nose, his cleft chin, his flattened brow.
‘Let Edward stay here with the wet nurses,’ Edmund told his wife later that night. ‘I shall ride east with my men, and you should follow us when you are rested. We might need another heir.’
‘You will fight him again?’ Ealdgyth said.
‘Of course.’
‘Will the men follow?’
‘Of course they will follow!’
But many of the men were reluctant.
‘They think of themselves as heroes,’ Edmund’s wife told him. ‘Heroes do not like to be kept in the field after victory. Let them go home and tell their wives all their exploits. What say you, Godwin?’
Godwin did not like to be called upon like this, but it was hard to keep men in the field who have bodies to take home.
‘We won at Sorestone, so throw a victory feast,’ Godwin said. ‘Parade your son to all the warriors and show that God has blessed you. Then let the men return home with news of our victory. They will take word of Edmund Ironside to the folk at home, and when home begins to dull, summon them again and they will bring twice as many men.’
News of the Battle of Sorestone spread; the mood of the whole country changed, like a silver coin that is tossed from heads to cross. Hundred courts met and in their enthusiasm unanimously decided to outlaw Knut from the land for ever.
Edmund and Godwin rode with a great company. They processed through Wessex. They rode openly on the Roman roads without fear of betrayal or detection. They got the same response each place they came to: a tearful admission of disloyalty, a bold declaration of support, a drunken evening.
Edmund accepted them at their word. The English were beginning to remember themselves. He was gracious. He was forgiving. He was their king.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Battle of Sudwerca
A month after the Battle of Sorestone, Knut sat in the king’s hall at West Minster, playing chess with Thorkel.
‘Is your king going to lie down and die?’ Knut asked, as he removed the last of the guards.
Thorkel moved the last of his king’s companions between his king and the warriors of Knut. ‘There,’ he grunted.
It took two moves for that last companion to die, and two more for Thorkel’s king to be surrounded and killed.
Thorkel reached across the cloth mat they were playing on and slapped Knut’s upper arm. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Well done!’
Knut had already won the second game that morning. Thorkel was letting him win, which irritated Knut almost as much as when Thorkel beat him.
‘I was lucky,’ he said.
Their minds were on Edmund, but they had no idea that the English king had gathered a mounted fyrd; that his men had spent three days circling far to the north out of sight of the Danish pickets; that they were at that very moment touching their heels to their horses, their spears gleaming silver with freshly whetted blades, riding slowly towards them.
As the smoke of Danish cooking fires were being stoked for breakfast, Edmund unfurled his banner, the White Dragon on a field of red, and led two thousand English towards the Danish ramparts to the north of the city.
The first Danes to die were walking back to camp after visiting a house where girls could be found. They were cut down and trampled as the sun lifted over the forests. Edmund kept his men going at a brisk pace. The turf was soft and springy. The horses passed swiftly over the dead Danes. They paused in the forest fringes when they saw the Danish ramparts and Edmund Ironside put on his silver helm, took out his hunting horn and blew a single note.
Danes came out half-dressed and bleary-eyed to take their morning toilet.
They barely had time to shout the alarm before Edmund Ironside cut them down.
Knut and Thorkel were setting up a third game when angry shouts disturbed the stillness. Knut ignored them, but Ottar the Black ran in.
‘It’s Ironside!’ Ottar said.
Knut was sick of that name and had banned its mention in his presence, but he let it go and leapt to his feet.
‘At last! Where is he?’
‘Here!’
‘We’ve found him?’
Ottar’s eyebrows met in a frown and he said, with typical Icelandic understatement, ‘Well, he’s found us.’
Knut ran out and looked in astonishment at the scene before him: English lead riders were already within the camp, hacking and stabbing. They were cutting down Knut’s men. The ditches that his men had dug with so much labour were swarming with English riders, who turned their horses’ heads straight at him.
One of the English threw a spear at him and it thudded into the wall of the barn.
‘I thought you said they would stay at home till after haymaking,’ he swore, but Thorkel was nowhere to be seen.
Knut drew his sword. He backed against the door. He feared treachery. Ottar grabbed a bearded axe and strode out into the yard and cut down a rider and horse with one mighty swing.
Suddenly Thorkel reappeared, organising a hasty defence.
He was almost as tall as some of the mounted men. He was a giant of legend, and when he ran, he seemed to lope across the ground.
‘To the boats!’ Thorkel shouted. ‘Fly!’
Knut got his feet wet as he scrambled through the muddy shallows to the Sudwerca banks. He turned and watched in silent fury as Edmund rode in state at the head of his warriors.
The Danes abandoned their plunder and their ramparts, fled across the river after their king, who watched the rout in fury and dismay as the gates of Lundenburh, which had remained closed to him for so long, were thrown open. The city that he had worked so hard to starve was soon supplied with wagons of grain and herds of livestock.
Queen Emma greeted Edmund. She sat on an old bay h
orse, with Eadwig behind her. They all looked leaner than last time Edmund had seen them.
Godwin and Edmund and all the English looked older and more battle-worn than last time Eadwig had seen them.
‘Much has happened,’ Edmund said.
‘We have heard.’ It was Queen Emma who spoke. From the reaction of the men about her, Edmund could see who it was who the people looked to for leadership.
Eadwig kicked his horse forward.
Edmund embraced him.
‘Thank you all!’ he called out. ‘Thank you, my people, for your faith and resolution.’
Godwin rode into Lundenburh with an odd mixture of delight and wariness. There were a lot of memories here, and when he heard that Caerl had been killed, he stopped and paused and sat down.
‘I am glad he died well,’ he said at last.
Godwin got very drunk that night. He and Beorn stripped to the waist and compared scars.
‘All in the front!’ Beorn declared.
‘That one is in the side!’ Godwin told him.
Beorn was appalled, before he realised Godwin was jesting.
‘All in the front!’ Beorn shouted. ‘I’ve never turned my back in battle!’
An hour later Godwin and Beorn were seeing how high they could piss up the hall wall.
‘I have a friend to visit,’ Godwin said suddenly.
He staggered out into the dark street and stumbled back in to fetch a lantern, then blundered through the dark streets to the Church of St Forster’s.
The church stood silent beneath its thick thatch; the windows were shuttered, the doors closed.
Godwin dragged the memory back to mind. It was here, he thought, and stood for a moment to piss again. Yes, he thought. It was here. Godwin wished he had brought wine for a libation, but he knelt down and then lay forward so that he was touching the earth, with his right ear pressed close.
He shut his eyes. The cool earth was soothing.
Blecca, he whispered in his mind, we did it! Was your spirit there? We did it, Blecca! You would have been proud of us.