Eadwine sprinted up the crumbling steps and ran round the ramparts to a point
where he could see the southward road.
It was empty.
So sure had he been that he would see it filled by his brother's approaching
army that at first he thought his eyesight must have failed. With an impatient
gesture he rubbed the stinging sweat out of his eyes with his torn and bloodstained
sleeve and looked again.
The road was still empty.
His stomach knotted into the hollow pain of fear. He had no need to look over
the northern rampart to see the smear of dust on the horizon that marked the
position of the invading army he had been harrying for the last two days and
nights of ambush, snare and murder. He had delayed them. He had left half
of them dead. He had made the survivors curse the day they came to Deira.
He had made their leader, one Black Dudda, into a bitter personal enemy who
had sworn to see him dead. And it had all been for nothing, if Eadric was
not here with the main army.
The old fort was half derelict and wholly indefensible. There was no garrison
of any kind. The local population would be no help in any fighting, accustomed
as they were to an easy and peaceful life here on the rich plain of Derwent
Vale. The warden of the northern march was supposed to protect them from border
raids, and no enemy had got this far in Eadwine's three years of tenure.
Until now.
The smear of dust on the northern horizon was perceptibly closer. An hour
away, Eadwine estimated, or a little more. A hundred warriors with fallen
comrades to avenge, thirsting for blood. And nothing stood between them and
the heart of Deira, except Eadwine and the battered handful of weary survivors
with him.
Snatches of talk floated up to him, as men shoved to slake their thirst at
the fort well.
"- I told him his high and mighty brother wouldn't bother coming, too
busy chasing skirt in Eboracum, I said -"
"And you know he won't hear a word against his brother, so you might
as well save your breath -"
"Reckon he's going to fight them here?"
"What, in this dump? Piss on these walls and they'd fall down."
"There's nowhere better, not til you get all the way to Eboracum. He'll
have to fight here."
"A dozen of us, against a hundred of them?"
"We fight bravely and make an end worthy of a song!"
"A bloody short song -"
"You got a better idea? If he runs home they'll call him a coward. Could
you face that?"
"I'd rather be dead!"
"No problem there. Sup up, lads, we'll all dine in Woden's hall tonight."
"First one there gets the beer in -"
"Last one gets the pick of the girls -"
Eadwine stopped listening. Icy sweat prickled down his spine. There was no
more scope for hit-and-run fighting now they were out of the moors and marshes
and onto the plain. If he did not fight here, he would have to flee ahead
of the invaders and bear the shame of being called a coward. If he made a
stand here, outnumbered many times over and with no useful defences, he and
the men with him would die. A stark choice, shame or death. Yet he could not
see it as simply as that. Already men had died at his command, men he had
known and counted as friends, men who had families who would mourn their loss
and perhaps curse him for it. If he was going to order men to die, he wanted
to have something practical to show for it. What could a stand against overwhelming
odds achieve? At best, they could hope to take a dozen of the enemy with them
and delay the rest for an hour or two. If Eadric was on his way with the army,
that hour or two would give Eadric time to get here and crush the invaders
before they could plunder Deira. That would be worth the cost. Eadric would
be proud of him.
He peered over the wall again. Still no sign of movement on the broad pale
ribbon of the southward road. Eadric was not coming.
"Why?" Eadwine muttered. "Why, why, why? Eadric, where are
you?"
To which, of course, there was no answer but a nameless, gnawing fear. Surely
nothing but some terrible disaster could have prevented Eadric from answering
his urgent summons? Eadric, the golden hero of Deira, would not have abandoned
even the insignificant youngest brother to fight outnumbered ten to one, except
in some dire need. What was that need? What was happening? What would Eadric
want him to do?
"Lord?"
Eadwine whipped round, startled out of his thoughts. Lilla, the youngest warrior
in the warband and the closest to a friend, had come noiselessly up the steps
and was holding out a pitcher. Clear water dripped down the sides, and Eadwine
was suddenly aware that his throat was parched dry as the dusty road. He drank
in greedy gulps, spilling water over his face and chest, forgetting to breathe
until he choked on it. How long since he had last drunk? This morning at least.
Twelve hours of fighting on a hot day, wearing metal armour. With the partial
slaking of his thirst came more unwelcome physical sensations, ignored until
then. Hunger, aching fatigue, the crushing weight of his mail shirt, the small
pains of minor wounds, a dull throb behind his eyes. And over it all the sick
dread of anxiety. Why had Eadric not come? What to do for the best?
"Wulfgar says it's just a raid," Lilla said, sounding doubtful.
"He says they'll loot the hall here, burn a few unimportant villages
and go home."
Eadwine winced. That was typical of Wulfgar, who was good at fights and better
at starting them. Talking of 'burning unimportant villages' in front of Lilla,
who had joined the warband after his family and home were destroyed in a raid,
was tactless even by Wulfgar's clodhopping standards.
Lilla grinned, and pushed his mop of chestnut hair back from his face. "I
didn't fight him. I thought you wouldn't thank me for it. Anyway, it's boring.
I always win."
"Almost always," Eadwine said dryly. Lilla was small and lithe and
fast, like a stoat to Wulfgar's bullock, but brawn had been known to triumph
over speed. "And in answer to your next question, of course he's wrong.
A raiding party is a dozen or a score. Two hundred is an army."
"They look in a hurry to get somewhere, too," Lilla added. "Where?"
"It can only be Eboracum." Eadwine gestured at the southward road.
"That's where that army-path goes. It's the heart of Deira. If they take
Eboracum they take the kingdom."
"But -" Lilla began, and broke off uneasily.
"Go on."
"Well - I've never seen Eboracum. But you say it's a great city. A fortress.
Bigger than my whole village and all the fields around. Even if they still
had the two hundred they started with, that wouldn't go far against Eboracum,
would it?"
Eadwine sighed. He had been puzzling over that himself for two days without
mentioning his doubts to anyone, but he should have known Lilla would be bright
enough to work out the problem for himself. "They might as well try to
fell a tree with a spoon," he agreed.
"So what are they really after?"
"If I knew that," Eadwine said wearily, dragging his hand through
his filthy dark hair, "I'd know how best to stop them getting it."
Movement below forestalled Lilla's reply. A stocky fair-haired warrior was
shepherding a fussy little man in through one of the cart-sized breaches in
the fort wall.
"Ah!" Eadwine exclaimed. "Ashhere's found the steward. About
time!"
In theory he should stand on his dignity as the king's son and wait for the
steward to come to him, but he had never cared much for protocol. He raced
down the steps two at a time, careless of the loose stonework. Lilla paused
to retrieve the pitcher and followed at a rather more sensible pace.
"Message? What message?" said the steward blankly, when he was
finally convinced that the smoke-blackened and bloodstained scarecrow in front
of him was indeed the king's youngest son. "No, Garulf never came here.
Know him anywhere, I would. Was it important?"
"You're about to be invaded by Black Dudda and a Bernician army,"
Lilla informed him. "In about an hour, I'd say."
The steward paled. Evidently Black Dudda's reputation was known even this
far south. "The Butcher of Eden Vale?" He flapped his hands as if
trying to swat a wasp. "Why aren't you fighting them? You're supposed
to guard the border! You're supposed to protect us!"
Deornoth, headman of the village at Beacon Bay and leader of what was left
of its militia, spat. "A bit of help wouldn't go amiss," he said,
with a sour glance at the steward's immaculate clothes and comfortable paunch.
"Where are you when we get raided, eh?"
"Oh, well, if you can't put up with raids you shouldn't live on the border,"
said the steward, with a shrug.
"Leave it, Deornoth," Eadwine warned. "And you too, Fulla."
He swung round to confront a bearded barrel of a man in malodorous sheepskins
who subsided with a sulky muttering, then turned back to the steward. "You're
certain Garulf never passed here? So Eadric would never have got my message?"
"Looks that way," agreed the steward. "Any road, Lord Eadric's
got his hands full already. Rumour says he's fighting Aethelferth of Bernicia
way out west." A complacent wave of the hand indicated somewhere comfortably
far off. "Eboracum or Dere Street or somewhere."
The news struck Eadwine like a blow to the stomach. Eadric under attack! His
instinctive reaction was to race to his brother's side with all possible speed
and give his own life to save him. Then, hard on its heels, came rational
thought. Black Dudda's purpose became clear in flash of insight, like sunshine
breaking through fog. A surprise double attack, worthy of the clever and deceitful
Aethelferth. One army to march down Dere Street on the traditional invasion
route from the north and draw Eadric into battle on the plain. A second, under
Black Dudda, to appear on this back route out of the moors and stab Eadric
in the back.
So Eadric needed Black Dudda's army stopped. For a moment the prospect of
making a stand here and dying gloriously in the attempt beckoned to Eadwine
as sweetly as a girl in a summer hayfield. No-one could scorn him as a coward
if he did that. It was the warrior's way, the hero's way. But the glory would
be empty. A few deaths here, however noble, would not stop Black Dudda and
would not help Eadric. A warning might save his life. Put like that, it was
no choice at all.
Eadwine looked round wildly. "Get me a horse!"
The steward spread his hands. "We don't keep any horses here -"
"Then we march," Eadwine said grimly. "Now. We're an hour ahead
of them. If we march all night we might yet warn Eadric in time. Tell your
folk here to scatter and take their animals with them. Black Dudda is very
angry and he'll take it out on this estate, but he's in a hurry. He won't
go far from the road."
The steward gaped. "What? But you can't -"
Eadwine turned to Deornoth and Fulla and the other men of the militia. "You'd
best go home now. Look after your folk and your families. You've done your
duty and more besides."
Deornoth hesitated, looking half relieved and half disappointed, then offered,
"We'll stay if you ask us to."
"Just take note I've already done my seven days for this month,"
rumbled Fulla. "I know my rights."
"Believe me, I know you do," Eadwine said dryly. His stern face
softened. "I thank you for your offer, but your families need you more
than I do now. Someone needs to keep order on the March until I return."
"Aye," Deornoth agreed, unhappily. "You'll come back?"
"I am still the Warden of the March, until the king says otherwise or
until I die. Don't fear. Aethelferth and Black Dudda will break on Eboracum's
walls like a ship on your cliffs. Unless the Three Ladies choose otherwise,
I will be back before winter." He looked round for the five remaining
warriors of his warband, who were already picking up weapons and filling water
skins. "Got everything? Come on then -"
"Well!" declared the steward to the world in general. "I never
thought I'd see the day when a king's son ran away like a coward without a
blow struck, leaving us defenceless in the path of an army -"
Eadwine turned on him like a stooping falcon. "Half an army. Thanks to
us! Don't tell me you didn't see the beacons summoning men to fight. And what
did you do? Nothing! You left the Marchmen to do the fighting while you dozed
behind our shields. You in the south think because you never see a raider
that means there aren't any. Well, you're about to find out what it's like,
and it's your responsibility to get the people of this estate through it with
the least possible harm. So get off your lazy arse and herd your sheep out
of danger. Earn your keep." He turned on his heel without waiting for
a response and strode back to his weary companions. "Come on. One more
march. You can rest in Eboracum."
On and on, mile after mile, the pale ribbon of the army-path unrolled through
field and copse and pasture. Following it in the faint starlight made few
demands on weary minds and bodies. None of them spoke. No-one had the energy
for the marching songs or ribald banter that would normally pass the time.
Half-stupefied with fatigue, Eadwine seemed to see the ghosts of all the other
soldiers who had marched this road in the past and would march it in times
yet to come, striding out to conquer new lands, or fleeing in shame from bloody
defeat, or hastening to the aid of comrades in some beleaguered outpost. He
thought with gratitude of the men who made the road, so long ago that no-one
now remembered who they were, or even whether they were men or giants or gods.
The builders were gone now, but their roads and their fortresses still remained,
still guarding the rich plains of Deira, if only men had the wit and the courage
to use them.
"Open up!" Eadwine hammered again on Eboracum's north gate. "Open
up!"
A pale worried face appeared on the ramparts above the gatehouse. "Who's
there? Stand back so I can see you."
"I am Eadwine son of Aelle," Eadwine shouted up, stepping back onto
the causeway so that the morning light would shine on his face and armour.
"Open up!"
The sentry was still wary. "Give the password."
"I've been away for half a year, how would I know today's password?"
Eadwine snapped back, losing patience. "But I know you, Ceolred. You
hold land from Aldhere of Eoforwic, your ginger sow got into your storeroom
last Yule and drank all the beer you'd brewed for your sister's wedding, your
children are called Eadgyth and Ceolferth and your wife was expecting another
this Midsummer just gone. Now get down here and open this gate!"
Running footsteps pattered in the gatehouse, the locking bar rattled in its
socket, and the gate creaked open to reveal two suspicious spearmen.
"Can't be too careful," mumbled the older of the two, reluctantly
standing aside. "Raiders and thieves all over the place, they've already
burned the wharves and all the boats on the river, and folk say there's an
army coming -"
"Two armies," Eadwine corrected grimly. "Or rather, one and
a half. Where can I find my brother?"
"Lord Cynewulf's with the King -"
"No, no, my brother. Lord Eadric. The heir to Deira. Where is he?"
The guards exchanged awkward glances. Eadwine's voice grew sharp with anxiety.
"What's happened? Tell me!"
The older sentry put a hand on his arm with rough kindness. "Easy, lad."
Eadwine went very still. What little colour was left in his face drained away
and his voice dropped to a whisper. "Is he hurt?"
The sentry swallowed, shuffled, and finally spoke.
"Lord Eadric is dead."
Eadwine stumbled to his knees beside the remains of the pyre. So it was true.
Eadric was dead, and it seemed the sun had fallen out of the sky.
He found he was clutching a handful of ashes, as if trying to reach out to
his beloved brother. Sighing, he opened his hand and let the grey fragments
drift away on the wind. He should have formed a shield-wall and offered battle
at Derwentcaster fort after all. A world without Eadric in it was a world
not worth living in.
A slight sound penetrated his misery. He looked up, and for a moment his heart
leaped in wild joy. Some mistake! Eadric was here, alive and well -!
He reached out and the illusion faded. Not Eadric. Eadric's son, Hereric.
The boy had his father's blond colouring and muscular build, and the deceiving
eye of hope had done the rest. Hereric's face was puffy from crying, his blue
eyes bewildered. He recognised his young uncle and crept out from the willows
fringing the river.
"My father's dead," he said, in a flat, dead tone that failed to
stop his voice from quivering..
Eadwine's heart went out to him. Here was someone in greater need than himself.
"Yes," he answered, not trusting himself to say more.
"He died in battle." Hereric sniffed, unable to stop himself, and
paused until he thought he had his voice under control again. "He was
very brave -"
The sentence terminated in something between a snort and a sob, and the boy
turned round hastily to hide his face.
"We'll avenge him, Hereric," Eadwine said quietly. "All those
who killed him will die."
"But it won't bring him back!" That was a howl of pure misery, as
Hereric gave way to his grief. "He's dead! Oh, he's dead, he's dead,
and I'll never see him again -!"
The tears came in a scalding flood, and Eadwine put his arms around the boy
and held him until the storm passed and Hereric's racking sobs died away into
a series of sniffles and gulps and long shaking breaths. He said nothing,
because he knew that if he spoke he would break down himself.
After a while, Hereric pulled away, averting his face and scrubbing at his
eyes. Eadwine looked tactfully in the opposite direction until a tug at his
sleeve indicated that Hereric considered himself presentable again.
"Don't tell anyone I was crying," he said, in a small and shaky
voice, and then began to cry again, quietly and hopelessly. "I don't
want to leave him," he wept, "it's all cold and grey and lonely
here -"
"But he isn't here any more," Eadwine said softly, striving for
something that might ease the boy's grief. "He isn't lying in the cold
ashes. His spirit has flown away on the smoke and gone straight to the gods.
So you and I are here missing a father and a brother, and your mother is missing
her husband, but Eadric isn't missing us. Tonight is his great night. Tonight
he enters Woden's hall. Don't think of him as he was when he was laid on the
pyre, but as he is now. The limp that troubled him since his fall two winters
ago has gone. The wounds that killed him have all vanished. His hair is thick
and gold and gleaming, even where he was going bald on top. He is as strong
and handsome and merry as when he was a young man and carried you around on
his shoulders, but he has the wisdom and the experience of his years. He is
dressed in his best clothes - green trousers, a blue tunic, a scarlet cloak.
A slave girl is arraying him for war. She settles his mail shirt on his shoulders.
Girds his sword at his waist. Standing on a stool - for he was a tall man
- she sets his boar-crested helmet on his head. In his left hand he takes
his shield. In his right he grips his spear."
A quick glance sideways confirmed that he had Hereric's rapt attention.
"Now see him entering Woden's hall. It is a magnificent building, a hundred
times bigger than the palace at Eboracum, built not from stone but from massive
timbers hewn by the giants at Thunor's command. Tapestries worked by Frija
and her maidens adorn the walls, showing how Woden hung upon the World Tree
to win the mead of poetry, how Thunor fought the serpent and defeated the
giants. All are so richly ablaze with gold and colours that the pictures seem
alive. A great fire burns in the centre, built from whole trees, and the light
of it flows over the land for miles around. Over it hangs a huge cauldron,
big enough to cook two whole oxen at once. Woden's handmaids, each as fair
as the fairest princess, carry mead and meat and bread to the warriors. A
skald sings the Lay of Beowulf. All the great warriors are there, at feast
after a day in the field. Look along the mead-benches at all the famous faces.
There is Offa, who was king in Angeln over the sea. Osferth, who first brought
the men of Deira across the sea to serve the Emperors in Britannia. Westerfalca,
who kept faith with the kings of Eboracum when the Jutes rebelled and was
recognised as the first king of Deira in consequence - your great-great-great-great
grandfather, Hereric. And at his side sits Eadhelm, your uncle who fell at
the battle of Caer Greu and who your father avenged on the field. Every man
there is a king or an atheling.
"Now the door swings wide. The flames flicker and out of the swirling
smoke strides your father. His mail coat glitters. The grey blade of the spear
in his hand glints. The red eyes of the boar upon his helmet glow as if alive,
defying anyone to harm the man under its protection. On his shield the fire-drakes
writhe, blue and red and green. The hilt of his sword, gold and jewelled,
flashes in the firelight so that it hurts the eye to look upon it. At his
shoulder the brooch on his cloak sparkles. Beside him the slave girl, though
a strapping lass, can barely stagger under the weight of gold and silver plate
in her arms.
"The skald ceases in his song. All along the mead-benches the warriors
stop their talk, fall silent and turn to gaze. Woden's handmaids pause in
their serving and stare, nudge one another and whisper. There are great names
among the drinkers in that hall, men who were kings here on earth, yet none
came there more richly provisioned, nor more noble in his bearing. All eyes
follow him as he strides through the hall. Who is he, this tall and handsome
man, bearing gifts of such splendour? Surely a king, king of the greatest
kingdom on earth.
"He approaches the top table where the gods sit at meat, the three sons
of Tiw Allfather who rule the world of the gods. Woden in the centre, an awesome
figure more than man-high, his face shrouded, his one eye burning like a coal.
Lord Frey on the left, the foster-son, his golden hair bright as the sun.
Thunor on the right, his shoulders three times broader than a big man, his
red beard flowing over his mighty chest. On the table before him lies his
hammer, that forged the earth and has shattered many a giant's skull, and
in his hand he holds the whetstone that makes the lightning flash in the skies.
You and I, Hereric, would fall in fear before them, but your father has passed
the dread gates of death and they hold no terror for him. He stands before
Woden as a thane before his king, respectful, admiring, but not servile, a
free man among his equals. At his gesture, the slave girl spreads her burden
on the table before the gods. They are pleased with the gifts, for though
they have many rare and beautiful things, they have nothing finer.
"Woden rises, cloaked in shadow. He is tall, taller than the tallest
man, and his head brushes the rafters of that lofty hall. His voice is like
the roar of flame in a forest, like the thunder of waves upon a shore. Woden
speaks."
Eadwine pitched his own voice as deep as it would go. "Welcome to my
hall, Eadric son of Aelle, Atheling of Deira. Long you have been in the coming.
There is one here who has waited for you."
He reverted to his normal tones with a certain amount of relief. "And
from the mead-benches rises his brother Eadhelm who fell alongside the kings
of Eboracum at Caer Greu more than twenty years ago. They embrace, for they
were close here on earth and long kept one another's backs against the foe,
and it was to avenge Eadhelm that Eadric slew the Bernician prince. He takes
his place on the mead-benches, between Eadhelm and Westerfalca. Mead is brought
to him, and boiled meat, and fine white bread. And at a word from Woden the
skald sings again, but this time it is a new lay, the Lay of Eadric of Deira,
the scourge of Bernicia, the helmet of his people.
"And at the end of the evening, when men are beginning to think not of
talk and song but of sleep, Lady Frija, Queen of the gods, enters the hall.
More lovely is she than any human lady, adorned with gold and jewels of rare
beauty. She bears a great golden cup filled with rich red wine, and after
Woden and Thunor and Frey have drunk she carries the cup to your father, first
among all Woden's thanes. Her eyes are bright like the stars at evening, and
her voice is like the sparkling of clear water."
He considered trying to imitate a goddess' falsetto and decided against it.
If he succeeded he would never hear the last of it. "She welcomes your
father to her lord's hall, and says that she will never again fear the attacks
of the giants. And so your father enters Woden's service, not the least among
his housecarls, and there he will fight for Woden and Thunor against the giants
until you go to join him and are welcomed to Woden's hall in your turn."
Hereric sniffed again, but his face had relaxed and when he spoke his voice
was more normal. "I wish somebody had told me all that before."
"Surely you knew about Woden's hall?"
"Sort of," agreed Hereric, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "But
nobody tells it like you do. I missed you when you went up north." He
peered up at the sky. "Is Dad really up there somewhere looking down
on us?"
"Yes," Eadwine said firmly. Consoling the boy had brought him some
comfort too. "So we have to make him proud of us. You'll grow into a
fine young man in a few years, and people will look at you and see your father
in you. You're his immortality, Hereric, as much as any of the poetry his
skalds will sing about him. As long as men remember him as the great hero
he was, he will never really die." He took Hereric's arm. "Come
along. The sun is well into the west and we ought to be getting back to the
city before they bar the gates. This is no time to be outside the walls. Look
at the smoke in the north! The Bernicians can't be more than a few miles away."
"Why aren't you fighting them?"
Eadwine managed not to flinch at the question. "I have been."
"Did you win?"
"Not exactly."
Hereric looked doubtful, not being aware that the question could have any
answer other than yes or no. He liked his young uncle, who was undeniably
odd and whose interest in Brittonic poetry and devotion to his betrothed made
him a frequent target of mockery, but who was kind and funny and always had
time for him. Hereric did not want to think Eadwine was a coward and have
to despise him. He swallowed. "You didn't -" he hesitated over the
shameful words "- you didn't run away?"
"Not exactly."
Hereric swallowed again. "Did you kill lots of Bernicians?"
"Yes."
Hereric looked a little happier with that answer, though still puzzled.
"Why aren't you pleased about it?"
Eadwine ran his free hand wearily through his hair. "Because it doesn't
seem important any more."
"Why are they attacking us? King Aethelferth's supposed to be our ally,
isn't he? Since Aunt Acha went to Bernicia to marry him. It's not fair!"
"Because Aethelferth never keeps his promises," Eadwine said bitterly.
"His Brittonic nickname is Aethelferth Flesaurs, which means Aethelferth
the Twister in our language. You know his banner is a double-headed serpent?
Think of it as a two-faced snake. It suits him."
"Why -" Hereric began, and broke off, shrinking close to Eadwine's
side in sudden fear. The riverside path was barred by a huge warrior, towering
half a head taller than Eadwine (who was himself a tall man), broad in proportion,
and bristling with red hair and red beard. He could have been the god Thunor
come to earth, except that instead of a whetstone and a hammer he carried
a wicked-looking spear and a small round shield of unmistakable design.
Hereric planted himself shoulder-to-shoulder with his uncle and drew his small
eating knife from his belt, determined to sell their lives dearly.
"It's all right, Hereric," Eadwine said, "this is Drust. He
belongs to my warband."
Hereric's eyes were as round as the shield. "But he - he - he's -"
his voice dropped to a shocked whisper "- he's a Pict!"
"Son of the Goddess," chorused Eadwine and Drust in unison.
Drust grinned. "Ye're learning." He looked down on Hereric like
a kindly giant. "Ye can put the knife away, laddie. Ye're safe enough.
We only eat boys at the full moon."
Hereric gulped, and then realised he was being teased. His expression changed
from one of terror to one of fascination.
"I keep my tail in my trews and my cloven hooves in my boots," remarked
Drust, after some minutes under Hereric's unblinking stare.
Hereric blushed and stammered an apology.
"Och, dinna fret, laddie. Ye're no the first to look at me like that
here."
"You ought not to be wandering around on your own down here," Eadwine
said. "Didn't I tell you to go to the King's hall for food and rest?
Big square stone building in the middle of the city, go through the courtyard
and the hall's opposite the main gate, you can't miss it." He ran a hand
through his hair in a distracted gesture. "I meant to -"
"Ye did, and I didna mind ye. I dinna care tae leave my lord outwith
the walls, and with the enemy so close. Yon guard tried tae stop me, but I
can take care of myself."
Eadwine sighed. "I'm sure you can, but I don't want you beating up all
our soldiers. Here." He unfastened the brooch from his cloak, turning
it so the incised bull design caught the light. "My word doesn't count
for much here, but the badge of my father's house does. Wear that and no-one
will challenge you."
"How come you're working for Uncle Eadwine?" Hereric interrupted,
his curiosity overcoming his alarm.
"We agreed -" Eadwine began.
"He beat me," said Drust, admitting the disgrace with the air of
one who won't shirk an unpleasant duty but wants to get it over with as soon
as possible.
Hereric looked at his uncle with new respect. He had beaten this mighty warrior?
"So you're his slave? But you've got weapons and everything -"
"I swore to serve him if he let my men go free. Ye could call me a hostage."
Hereric frowned. "So your men left you and ran away? That's disgusting!
They should have died for you!"
"Aye, weel. And they would ha' done, in a fair fight, if they thought
it would ha' saved me. But as it was -" he cast Eadwine a glance of grudging
admiration "- as it was, none of us was going to get home alive. So I
made a bargain."
"They should still have died for you! You had a right to expect them
to!"
Drust fixed him with a disconcerting stare. "Ye think so, laddie? Ye
dinna think they had a right tae expect me tae spot the trap? I was the fool.
'Tis right I should pay the price. 'Tis a cruel thing tae have other men die
for ye, laddie. Ye mind that, when ye're old enough tae lead."
"But - you're the important one - they don't matter -"
"Hereric, I'm surprised at you," Eadwine said, a sharp edge in his
tone. "Where did you get that idea from? Everything works both ways.
You expect your men to obey you, and that means you have to take as much care
of their lives and their honour as you do of your own. More, if anything.
You expect the people of your lands to feed and clothe and maintain you and
your warband, so they expect you to protect them. Rights on both sides. That's
what makes it fair." He looked at the smoke smearing the northern horizon
and his hands clenched and unclenched like a man in pain. "And the Twister
is burning Eboracum Vale, and I can't stop him! I couldn't even keep Black
Dudda out of my own March -!"
"Och, they'll be away home soon," Drust said comfortably. "The
Twister canna take yon city. Ye could hold it with a parcel of weans and women.
I'm thinking yon auld Romans canna ha' been much for fighting, or they wouldna
ha' needed tae build such a thing."
"Cynewulf says that," Hereric put in, excited to be discussing warfare
with this exotic new acquaintance. "He says walls are for cowards and
we should march out and fight on the honest earth like men!"
"Cynewulf is the biggest fool on the Council, and that's a hotly contested
title," Eadwine said. "All mouth and prick, as - as -"
He broke off. That had been Eadric's epithet for his illegitimate rival, and
the sudden reminder of his loss took his breath away.
"But lots of people say the same," argued Hereric. "Treowin
agrees with him." He only just refrained from adding "So there!"
Treowin was Eadwine's oldest and closest friend, so Hereric expected Eadwine
to concede the point immediately. Instead, Eadwine merely shook his head and
sighed.
Drust grinned. "Och, 'tis all true that ye Sassenach sheep havena the
sense of a babe. Aethelferth canna take yon city, but on the field he'll eat
ye, laddie. He's thrashed every king in the North who's ever fought him."
"But they were only Brittonic, or Irish, or something," Hereric
protested. "Not proper warriors like us. Everyone says we'll beat him
in battle easy enough."
Drust's grin turned into incredulous laughter. "Och, if I'd ha' known,
I'd ha' led my men down Dere Street and never bothered with yon cliffy coast,
and I'd be King of the North in Eboracum now. Ye seem determined tae lose."
He sobered up, and turned to Eadwine. "'Twould be funnier if I wasna
in the middle of it. Can ye make them see sense?"
"I never have yet," Eadwine said wearily, "but I can try."
Hereric looked uncertainly from one to the other. He was looking forward to
the excitement of a battle that would avenge his beloved father. The prevailing
wisdom at court considered Eadwine a dreamer with a head full of moonshine,
and as Drust had lost to him he must be even less of a warrior, so therefore
their opinions should be of little account. But they sounded very certain.
And his father's death had shaken his belief in Deiran invincibility.
"So what do you think we should do, then?"
"Stand a siege," Eadwine answered instantly. "Look at the walls,
Hereric! Imagine you're an enemy soldier trying to attack. Could you climb
them? No. Could you batter them down? No. Could you break open the gates?
Not with us on the towers and the gallery hurling stones and spears and arrows
at you. So you sit down outside and try to starve us out. But you're a long
way from home, you've no shelter, it's past the end of summer and in a few
weeks it's going to be wet and cold, you've burnt all the harvest on your
way here, and after a few weeks of bad food and bad water and sleeping in
the mud your soldiers start falling sick with camp fever. And then we sally
out from the city, where we've been warm and dry all this time, and Aethelferth
will think himself lucky if he gets home alive. That's what cities are for.
That's why Coel the Old made the giants build Eboracum for him, a long, long
time ago."
They hurried in through the river gate, almost a short tunnel since the walls
were so thick, and Hereric felt almost sorry for the attackers.
"Can I -?" he began, but was interrupted by a disapproving voice.
"Eadwine! I was just about to send a search party! Where have you been?"
"Visiting my brother's grave," Eadwine said sharply. "By the
Hammer, Treowin, why so many people? It looks as if you've come to arrest
me!"
"Don't joke about it!" Treowin exclaimed. He was about Eadwine's
age, the son of Deira's most aristocratic family, a thin, dark young man with
an intense manner. He jerked his head in the direction of the smoke in the
north. "I hope you've got a good reason for that."
An attractive dark-haired woman, no longer quite young, pushed her way through
the crowd, calling Hereric's name in a strong Brittonic accent. Hereric scowled,
recognising her as Rhonwen, one of his mother's ladies, and tried to hide
behind Drust. But he was too late. Rhonwen had seen him, and swept down as
inexorably as the incoming tide.
"Hereric! You bad boy! Your mother was so worried - Why, Eadwine! They
told me you were back." She stood on tiptoe, put her arms round Eadwine's
neck, kissed him very deliberately, whispered something in his ear that made
him start and stare at her, and then took Hereric's reluctant hand and led
the boy away, throwing a suggestive smile over her shoulder.
"Old flame still burning for you, eh?" Treowin smirked, joining
in the ribald laughter. "Nice-looking piece. You take her up on it. No
call for you to be faithful to your wife after you're married, never mind
before."
Eadwine was still gazing after the woman, not listening, his mind in a whirl.
Those whispered words had not been an amorous invitation after all. Rhonwen
had said, Princess Heledd fears for the boy's life. Come to her chambers after
dark.
Treowin shook him by the shoulder. "You've work to do first." He
looked at his friend sympathetically. "You look terrible. I'm sorry,
I'd make excuses for you if I could, but the Council said now and they said
it more than an hour ago. I hope your story's a good one. They're not pleased
with you."
"And what the hell have you been doing?" Aethelferth of Bernicia
slammed his fist into his palm and every man within earshot jumped. "You
got here in twice the time with half the men. What are you, an old woman?"
Black Dudda stumbled through his sorry tale. The harbour mouth blocked by
a burning ship so he had to land on the wrong side of the river. The ford
spiked with Roman thorns, turning it into a killing ground of crippled and
floundering men under a stinging rain of arrows. The deliberately set moorland
wildfire that engulfed his camp and roasted those who could not run. The scouts
and forage parties who set out and never returned. The sudden assault from
forest or reed-bed that came without warning and vanished without trace, save
for the wounded and dead.
The scar on Aethelferth's face stood out livid against his tanned skin as
he listened, never a good sign, and the other captains and warlords exchanged
wry glances. Black Dudda had been the subject of much envy when Aethelferth
selected him for command, but now it looked like a very short straw indeed.
More than one put a hand to an amulet or good-luck charm and offered silent
thanks to their favourite god or saint.
"I told you they'd got a competent marchwarden for once," commented
one of the captains, speaking Anglian but with the lilting accent that betrayed
a Brittonic origin. "There's a reason why I've given up raiding that
coast."
Aethelferth gave him a level stare. "You know him? Who is he?"
"Eadwine son of Aelle. Your new wife's youngest brother. Half-brother,
I should say. Lord King," he remembered, as an afterthought.
Aethelferth frowned. "Acha doesn't think much of him. He's a stripling."
"He's a weasel bastard and I'm going to break his neck!" snarled
Black Dudda, who did not take defeat well.
The Brittonic captain eyed him with dislike and not a little satisfaction.
Even in the fierce company of Aethelferth's captains Black Dudda was regarded
with a mixture of disgust and fear. He turned back to Aethelferth.
"Eadwine is young, yes, but he's sharp. And he's his mother's son. Or
perhaps I should say his grandfather's grandson. Your fathers slew Peredur
King of Eboracum and his brother over twenty years ago at Caer Greu, and Peredur's
son ran away, yes. But Peredur left a daughter too, and she married Aelle
and made herself Queen of both Eboracum and Deira. This Eadwine is the result.
He is the heir of Coel the Old, King of all the North, and this is Coel's
city. Blood like that tells, Lord King."
An uneasy muttering broke out, and the captains looked unhappily across the
newly-deserted fields to Eboracum, glowing gold in the setting sun. The ancient
fortress was rectangular and immensely strong, sitting on a natural defensive
site between two rivers. The broad River Ouse flowed past the south-west walls,
spanned by a single imposing stone bridge that linked the fortress with the
civilian city on the opposite bank. On the east side of the fortress was the
River Foss, smaller but still a notable barrier, and the two rivers joined
at an oblique angle some half a mile south of the fortress, protecting that
flank. If any enemy made it across the natural defences, he was faced with
a deep ditch to cross, full of clinging brambles. Then an earth rampart topped
by thirty feet of vertical limestone walls jointed without ledge or crack.
The massive gates in each wall were flanked by projecting towers and topped
by a fighting gallery, from which the defenders could rain missiles down onto
the attackers. Two huge many-angled towers on the corners fronting the Ouse,
and more towers at the other two corners and at intervals round the rest of
the circuit, completed the picture.
Aethelferth's captains, hardened fighters to a man, paled. The emperor who
had rebuilt the city's forbidding defences three centuries before had intended
it to overawe barbarian warriors. It was still working.
Aethelferth spat. His original intention had been thoroughly wrecked, partly
by Black Dudda's delay and partly because the Deirans had bolted into their
city like mice into a hole at his approach, rather than marching out to stop
the burning of Eboracum Vale as they were supposed to. But he was rarely at
a loss for long. He already had a new plan for the impregnable city.
"Remember, lads," he said, "it ain't the walls that fight.
You think Aethelferth the Twister can't outwit Aelle Ox-brains?" He drew
his sword and held it up, the blade glowing red in the dying light. "Hear
me, Woden! Hear me, O Masked One, Lord of Hosts, Master of the Gallows, Giver
of Victory! Put fear into the hearts of our enemies, shackle them in the war-fetters,
drive them witless and terrified before us! Give us victory, and I will give
to you Aelle and his son Eadwine, King and Atheling, as a gift to your power!
This I swear on my sword and call all the gods as witness! Hear me, O Terrible
One! Hear me!"
A large black crow, startled by the shouting, flapped out of the trees and
flew away looking for a more peaceful place to roost.
"A raven!" someone cried. "The bird of Woden! See, it flies
over the city! An omen! He has given them into our hands!"
Paths of Exile is available to buy from Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, Amazon.ca, Amazon.com, and bookshops should be able to order copies. It is also available from the Book Depository (free worldwide shipping).
Paths of Exile is published by Trifolium Books UK.
