With a savage roar, Beobrand leapt over the corpse to meet the next foe-man.
“Their king is ours!” he shouted. “For Bernicia!”
His black-shielded warriors were fighting with ferocious fury, but they faced the strongest in the Deiran warhost now – the king’s comitatus – and their advance slowed as they were each confronted with formidable foes.
The warrior who loomed before Beobrand wore a polished helm with nose guard and cheek plates. The helm was crested with a great, red-dyed horse-tail plume that trailed down his back. The man’s black shield was blazoned with a red star. He was young and arrogant and his face twisted into a sneer as he faced Beobrand. It was Odda, the man Wulfstan had warned him about.
“The scops will sing of this moment!” he shouted.
“They always sing of war,” spat Beobrand, readying himself for the attack he knew would come.
“They will sing of your death by my hand,” screamed Odda, and swung at Beobrand’s head.
Beobrand raised his shield, but suspected a feint. Just as he’d thought, Odda shifted his weight and changed his sword swing in an attempt to gut Beobrand. Anticipating the move, Beobrand lowered Nægling and parried the blow. Then, as fast as thought, with a twist of his wrist he sent a thrust into Odda’s groin. Odda had expected either to have struck Beobrand, or for the thegn of Ubbanford to have been on the retreat. And yet it was not only Beobrand’s strength, speed and sword-skill that made him one of the deadliest adversaries in all of Albion; it was also that he never backed down. Odda’s eyes widened in shock as he felt the bite of Beobrand’s blade, as it buried into his inner thigh, beneath his byrnie and deep into his flesh. Beobrand recognised the expression on the young warrior’s face. He had seen it many times before on the faces of those whose ghosts haunted his dreams. Odda had been so certain of his prowess. He was not the first warrior to underestimate Beobrand, and would surely not be the last.
Odda, wide-eyed and pale, swiped another attack. Beobrand took the sting from the blow on his shield, and then hacked into the man’s sword arm, just above the wrist. Blood bloomed and soaked Odda’s sleeve. It was not a strong blow, but enough to make Odda drop his blade. He tried to stagger back, away from the deadly warrior before him, but he was held fast by the pack of bodies behind.
“There will be no singing of your death, Odda,” Beobrand said, driving Nægling into the Deiran’s throat. Odda’s eyes bulged in horror at the approach of his own end. Beobrand twisted Nægling, wrenching the blade free. Odda collapsed into the mud. This battle was what he had wanted. What all young, foolish warriors seek. They long for the glory, the battle-fame. The crash of the shieldwall. Too often all they find is a pathetic death, choking on their own blood as their life ebbs from them into the soil. For an instant, Beobrand felt sadness wash over him. He shook it away. Now was not the moment for remorse or sorrow.
Another ragged cheer came from the left. Beobrand raised himself up to his full height and could just make out Octa and Alhfrith reaching Oswine’s banner bearer.
“Are we going to let the atheling beat us to the prize?” Beobrand shouted. The Black Shields who heard him over the chaotic thunder of battle roared in defiance. Beobrand flicked another glance at where his son fought, towering over most of the Deirans. The fighting was furious there, and his heart was gripped with fear for his son. But Beobrand could not watch for more than a heartbeat, for another warrior was stepping over Odda’s corpse to meet him.
With a lurching twist in the pit of his stomach, he recognised the dark-bearded thegn.
Wulfstan.
Beobrand spat onto Odda. Of all the foe-men he might have to confront, that it should be his friend was cruel indeed. He had risked everything to save Wulfstan once. Now, in the rain-splattered seething mass of mud and death, he did not know how he could save him again. The gods must be laughing.
“I see Odda got what he deserved,” shouted Wulfstan, holding his shield and blood-smeared sword in the defensive warrior pose. Either side of them, the Bernicians and Deirans clashed, trading blows and dealing death.
“Odda was a fool,” said Beobrand.
“We are all fools, are we not?” replied Wulfstan, and leapt forward to attack.
Beobrand took the blow on his shield and sent a half-hearted riposte at Wulfstan that the Deiran easily parried. Beobrand thought perhaps his friend would seek to give the appearance of fighting, but would hold back, not wishing to slay one with whom he shared a friendship. But even as he thought this, so Wulfstan hammered his sword into Beobrand’s black shield, attempting to turn it. The board splintered and Beobrand felt the thrum of the impact in his arm.
“Do not look so shocked, Beobrand,” laughed Wulfstan. “We are enemies by order of our lords. Our oaths say we cannot be friends today.”
Beobrand felt a hot stab of rage. Wulfstan would speak to him of his oath! By Woden, he had broken his oath for this man. He had sullied his word for Wulfstan, and now this?
The Deiran sent a probing thrust at Beobrand’s legs. Beobrand pushed the sword blade away with the rim of his shield, but too slow. He felt the keen edge of the sword cut into the flesh above his right knee. He grunted and shook his head to clear it of thoughts of friendship and broken vows. Wulfstan was his foe now; the sworn enemy of Oswiu King. Girding himself for what must come, Beobrand watched the Deiran, focusing again, willing his anger and pain to once again transport him into that harmony of calm frenzy where he was faster than any man and no enemy could stand before him and live.
“You repaid your debt to me, Beobrand,” Wulfstan said, perhaps noting the change in his opponent. “Now we meet as enemies in battle, nothing more.”
Nothing more? What else was there?
With a growl of rage, Beobrand charged forward with his shield, clattering the iron boss into Wulfstan’s and forcing the Deiran back. As the shorter Wulfstan staggered, Beobrand sent a slicing cut at his exposed leg, opening up a deep cut just above his right knee, mirroring the wound he had received by Wulfstan’s hand.
They pulled apart. Beobrand was surprised there was space for movement, but the men about them were less closely packed than they had been until moments before. Wulfstan’s eyes widened as he felt the warmth of his own blood soaking his breeches. Neither man looked away to see what had caused the shift in the battle. They had each drawn blood and were wary now.
A lull was falling over the battlefield. Beobrand often thought that shieldwalls were like living things with their own thoughts and life. For in every battle there were moments when the men would act as if with one mind, and there was no explanation for it that Beobrand could fathom. Perhaps it was wyrd, perhaps the will of the gods, or maybe just happenstance, but such a change was occurring now, and he longed to look about him to make sense of it. But whether oblivious to the change, or angered by his wound, Wulfstan would not allow him the respite. The Deiran thegn rushed forward, leaping over Odda’s crumpled bloody form and swinging his sword in a great overarm arc. Beobrand caught the blow on his shield, hearing the board splinter again under the strength of the attack. In the same instant, he pivoted and sent his own scything cut at Wulfstan. The Deiran soaked up the force of it on his shield.
Shouts came from the left. Something had happened there, and Beobrand’s stomach knotted at the memory of seeing Octa and Alhfrith forcing their way towards Oswine’s banner. The shouts were loud and filled with dismay, but he could not make out the words as Wulfstan came at him again. Beobrand parried and riposted once more, but neither man scored a telling blow. Wulfstan was panting now, his breeches on his right side soaked and dark with blood. Beobrand’s leg burnt from the cut he had received, but he knew his wound was not as deep as Wulfstan’s. The Deiran was losing a lot of blood and was weakening.
“The atheling! The atheling!”
The shouts were clear now, strident with despair. Beobrand feared the worst. If Alhfrith had been slain, the Bernicians would lose heart. On such things rested the fate of shieldwalls. H
e had seen it countless times before. The loss of morale could prove deadlier than the most vicious attack.
Other words came from the Deiran host, intermingling with the shouts from the Bernicians in a confusion of sound like the crash of waves against the cliffs near Bebbanburg. They were but sounds with no meaning that Beobrand could detect from this distance over the tumult of the fighting that, whilst easing slightly, still raged all around him.
Wulfstan attacked again and Beobrand saw that the man was slowing. His mouth was agape and he panted. Whether from his exertion or from the pain of the cut to his leg, Beobrand could not tell. Beobrand parried and shoved him back, shield against shield.
Wulfstan, off balance and weakened as he was, stumbled. His heels caught Odda’s sprawled corpse and Wulfstan tumbled over to lie on his back in the mire. Beobrand stepped quickly towards him. Wulfstan still held his sword and was certainly not defenceless, but Beobrand knew that now was the time to end this.
He hesitated as he looked down at Wulfstan’s pale features. By Woden, he did not wish to kill this man. He thought of Wulfstan’s wife and children back at Ediscum. He had not saved Wulfstan from Heremod’s blade only to slay him now.
“Finish it,” hissed Wulfstan through gritted teeth. “You owe me nothing, Beobrand. It was our wyrd to fight, it seems.”
And then the words from the Deiran host rang out, as clear as the screech of a gull over the wave-rush noise of the North Sea.
“Oswine! The king is fallen!”
There was a sudden hush about the battlefield. Beobrand glanced to the left and saw that Oswine’s standard had vanished. And in an instant, like water rushing from a cracked jug, so the fight fled from the Deirans. They fell back from the Bernicians, like a receding tide, leaving behind them the charnel house flotsam of battle: broken bodies and discarded weapons. The tide-line of defeat.
“Black Shields!” Beobrand bellowed in his battle-voice. “Hold!”
All along the line the Deirans were fleeing. Many Bernicians rushed to follow, but Beobrand called his men back. He did not want them chasing after the retreating Deirans. They would become dispersed about the battlefield and many small fights would break out. There was safety together.
Wulfstan still lay at his feet and Beobrand stared down at him. His knee throbbed with each beat of his heart, but as quickly as it had come, so his anger at Wulfstan evaporated. The Deiran was merely fulfilling his oath to his king. It was not he who had done anything wrong. And it was certainly not his fault to have reminded Beobrand of his past weakness.
Beobrand took a step closer and Wulfstan lifted his blade.
“You will not be needing that,” said Beobrand. He jabbed Nægling into the soft earth, and reached out his hand. Wulfstan blinked up at him, the rain falling into his upturned face. He did not move. “It was our wyrd to fight,” said Beobrand, “but it is not your wyrd to die this day, my friend.”
Wulfstan hesitated for a heartbeat before dropping his own sword and taking Beobrand’s hand, allowing the tall thegn to haul him to his feet.
“Go,” hissed Beobrand.
Wulfstan stooped to retrieve his sword with a grimace of pain and then, with a nod, he turned and hobbled after the routed Deiran warhost. Beobrand watched him and let out a ragged sigh. Reaching down, Beobrand pulled Nægling from the ground and wiped its blade clean against Odda’s cloak. It took him three attempts to sheath the sword, such was the trembling of his hands.
His gesithas were closing in around him now. All about them lay the dead and the dying. Beobrand scanned the faces of his men. Fraomar seemed dazed, staring off into the south after the fleeing Deirans. Dreogan had picked up a gash to his head and his face was caked in blood. Many of the others were wounded, but as far as he could tell, all were hale enough.
“Attor,” he called, not seeing the wiry warrior and fearing the worst.
Attor jogged up from where he had been pulling an arm ring from a huge brute of a warrior who had been pierced through with a spear that yet jutted from his guts like a banner pole into the rain-driven air. Attor’s face was a mask of mud and blood, but his teeth showed white as he grinned.
“Lord?”
“Take Beircheart with you and find out what’s happened to Alhfrith.”
Attor nodded and made to go in search of the atheling. Beobrand grabbed his shoulder, holding him back.
“And Attor,” he said, his mouth filled with the sour taste of loss and fear, “find my son.”
Chapter 19
The rain had lost its fury as they trudged down the track to the small house Sulis shared with Leofman and their son, Eadwig. The sight of her home, with the cloud-wreathed mountains behind and smoke trickling from the thatch, should have filled her with joy, but Sulis could not stop gazing at the shape slumped over Brinin’s saddle. Alfwold’s blood-smeared corpse had been wrapped in a cloak and lashed to the horse with the rope that had previously held him against the rough bark of the oak to be tortured.
Alfwold was a good man. He had served Leofman and her well ever since she had arrived, and for many years before that. He had always been kind to her and Eadwig. She watched as the limp form beneath the blanket bounced with the gait of the horse. Brinin walked at the animal’s head, leading it by its reins. She followed close behind on her pony.
She had wept for a time when she had seen Alfwold lying in the dirt beneath the oak. But her tears had dried now. She watched Cynan, Ingwald and Halinard riding ahead and wondered at the violence she had brought into her world. She had been far off, but had seen Cynan cut down Aescferth as easily as she would have killed a hen for the pot. At first she had been shocked, her stomach had turned and she had questioned what she had done in bringing these men here. Then she had seen Alfwold, and her heart had hardened once more. She recognised Aescferth as one of Sidrac’s men. It was Sidrac, not she, who had brought death and killing to this small parcel of land deep within the mountains of Rheged.
They were all subdued and quiet when they arrived at the house. The men slid from their mounts and she noticed that Cynan placed his hand on the pommel of his sword. Their eyes darted as they looked around the land surrounding the farm.
Cynan made his way to Sulis and offered her a hand, all the while looking around warily; scanning for danger. He helped her down from the pony, peering into the distance in the direction they had come as if expecting pursuit. Her back did not pain her as much now, but she was exhausted and longed to be inside, dry and warm.
Halinard and Brinin untied Alfwold and were carrying the wrapped corpse towards the house when the door swung open.
Cynan moved away from her and drew his sword. Ingwald stepped in front of the men who bore Alfwold’s body, pulling his own blade from its scabbard.
The huge shape in the doorway took a faltering step outside into the rain and her heart soared to see Leofman on his feet. He was pale and leaning on a stick, but he was alive and he offered her a weak smile.
“Sulis, my dear,” he said, his voice deep and warm, “I thought I had lost you too.” Frowning now, he looked at the armed men. “Who are these men? Do I need to fetch my axe?”
“They are friends,” she said, rushing past Cynan and the others to embrace the giant of a man. He encircled her in one of his massive arms and she enjoyed the feeling of safety of his broad chest and firm belly pressing against her. He smelt of woodsmoke, honey and sheep’s wool. And there was something else, something that soured her mood once more. Underlying his familiar scent, she detected the sharp taint of sickness.
“Cynan,” she said, “this is my husband.” Then, to Leofman: “We bring bad tidings.” He looked from the grim-faced warriors with their swords in hand, to the wrapped body carried between two of the newcomers.
He let out a long sigh.
“I imagine we could all use a drink then,” Leofman said. “You had better come on in out of the rain.”
Brinin and Halinard brought Alfwold’s body inside and laid it on one of the large rush mat
s that covered most of the hard-packed earth floor. The two men then wordlessly went outside to tend to the animals. Sulis called after them that there would be room for a couple of the beasts in the barn. The others would need to find shelter in the lee of the house.
While they saw to the horses, Sulis broke the news of Alfwold’s death to Leofman. He closed his eyes for a long while. Groaning with the pains of his battered body, Leofman bent down and pulled the cloak away from his bondsman’s face. She had watched Cynan close Alfwold’s eyes before he was wrapped in the cloak, but they were open once again and staring sightlessly at the soot-stained thatch and beams of the roof.
“Did he die well?” Leofman asked, staring into Alfwold’s dull eyes.
Sulis glanced at Cynan. Her throat was tight, she could not speak.
“As well as any man dies when set upon by six cowards,” said Cynan.
Leofman wiped a hand over his face.
“If they mean for us to leave this land, they do not know Leofman, son of Hutha.” He covered Alfwold’s face once more and with difficulty lowered himself onto a stool by the fire. Sulis held on tightly to his hand, helping him down, steadying him. He winced. His leg pained him, that much was clear. “This is our land.”
Brinin and Halinard came in from seeing to the horses. They removed their cloaks and shook them outside the door.
“Fetch our guests ale,” said Leofman. “Alfwold brewed some not two days ago and his ale is always good.” He fell silent and looked down at the shape under the cloak.
There were not enough stools or chairs for all of the men, so she decided to bring a wooden chest over. It was large and filled with clothes and bedding. It was too heavy for her to lift and she began to drag it. Brinin and Halinard hurried over to help. They carried it to the fire with ease. When they had all settled themselves around the hearth, she poured ale for each of them. They took the cups with nods of thanks.
For Lord and Land Page 18