by M J Porter
I wait, as does the entire church, expectant eyes on Jarl Halfdan as he gazes at me.
“Jarl Anwend, bring forth your son, I would know if this man is truly Lord Coelwulf, the murderer of my beloved son. He certainly doesn’t look the part.”
I bristle at the words, even though I anticipate them.
A youth I know to be Anwend Anwendsson rushes forward to stand by his father, an awed expression on his young face as he looks from Jarl Sigurd to me. His heavy eyebrows are so high on his young forehead that they almost disappear into his equally abundant hair.
“Yes, yes, that’s him,” Anwend splutters in Danish, his head bobbing in time with his words. The tension in my shoulders doesn’t abate, not one bit, because someone else is being thrust through the crowd at the instigation of Jarl Halfdan.
“Fuck,” my head all but explodes, because I can’t shout the word beyond the rag.
Goda, beaten and bloodied, his head hanging at a strange angle, turns pain-filled eyes my way, and startles, horror on his familiar face. His hair is tangled, his beard flecked with blood and what I take to be food. It looks to me as though they’ve been torturing my missing warrior, no doubt for information on me. My blood boils afresh, and I yank at my tied hands, even though I know it’s useless.
How, I consider, did Icel manage to ride away unharmed, and yet Goda was captured?
“Yes, it must be, take him away,” Jarl Halfdan observes Goda’s reaction, and dismisses him as quickly as he’s had him brought in. I try to reassure Goda with my eyes, but I know I can’t convey everything he needs to know, not without speech, and not looking the way I do.
Two large men drag Goda from the hall, his eyes never leaving mine. The black-clad warrior at my side stiffens, his stance no longer as casual as it should be.
I can’t even hiss at him.
“So Lord Coelwulf, you have, at last, accepted my invitation to join me in Repton.”
This isn’t my idea of an invitation, but I’m powerless to say anything. Not bound and gagged as I am.
“I expected someone with better clothes,” Jarl Halfdan laughs as he speaks, the rest of the warriors in the hall joining in, for all the jarl taunts me in Danish.
I can’t reply, and he doesn’t expect one.
“It appears that you don’t wish to willingly pledge your oath to the new rulers of Mercia. We had, obviously, expected some resentment.” Jarl Halfdan has switched to English, perhaps worrying that I won’t understand his gloating. I need only look at his eyes to appreciate his fucking intent.
“We allowed King Burgred to leave here, go to Rome to live out the last of his few remaining days.” Halfdan’s tone is filled with false compassion, and I struggle against my bonds. For all I hated King Burgred, and would probably have killed him myself given half a chance.
“But of course, the agreement could only be reached after he’d informed us of all who might object to the change in …. leadership. Your name was offered immediately and alone. I can see I should have sent Jarl Sigurd to retrieve you first of all. My mistake.” Halfdan speaks as though he’s the king here, and other than a reference to his dead son, there seems to be no desire for greater revenge. I can see unease on Jarl Anwend’s face. His son speaks frantically into his ear, while he tries to listen to Jarl Halfdan at the same time.
Fuck, I should have realised the lad would be here. I’d overlooked the possibility.
Yet Jarl Anwend holds his tongue, uncertainty on his face, despite his son’s increasingly frantic entreaties. Perhaps he’s just pleased to be armed at this impromptu meeting.
“Now, the choice is yours.” It seems to me that Jarl Halfdan rather likes the sound of his own damn voice. “You can still pledge your oath to my fellow jarls and me, or we can simply end your life. I’d sooner the latter. I don’t believe you’ll be a good ally, all things considered, and if you’re here, then I imagine your men are dead. That means you’re the lord of no one and fuck all.” Spittle flies from Halfdan’s mouth, to fall, slowly, flames shimmering in them. I concentrate on that more than what Halfdan actually says. “The fact that you killed my son, and also Guthrum’s means we will never trust you.”
I incline my head, as though accepting the point. I can’t speak, and the unease amongst the men who captured me seems to prove the point as well. What more should I say?
“So what will it be then?” Jarl Halfdan laughs as he imperiously asks the question, sitting forward eagerly on his chair and then turning to flick his eyes over the other jarls he says he rules with, but who’ve not been consulted.
Oscetel and Guthrum aren’t enjoying this as much as Jarl Halfdan. Far from it. I consider whose son I killed on my way north. Three men told me that their father’s led the Raiders. Only young Anwend was allowed to live, and only because of his resemblance to Rudolf. And because it suited me. Of course.
I already know I’ve killed one of Halfdan’s sons. He’s made no bones of that.
I remain still. I want to rip my bound hands free and grip them tightly around Jarl Halfdan’s throat, but I can’t. I feel small and insignificant, my hands covered in blood that I’ve spilt trying to uselessly fight my way free.
I don’t fucking like it, not at all.
“As you will,” Jarl Halfdan leans back, a satisfied grin on his face, as he picks out members of his audience and offers them a jaunty smile.
“We should do this immediately,” Jarl Halfdan exclaims, standing, as though about to take a sword and swipe my head from my shoulders without further thought. Only then he pauses, glancing at Jarl Sigurd and the silent black-clad warriors who surround me. They’re growing restless, a thread of disquiet about them.
Jarl Halfdan’s eyes narrow as he acknowledges them.
“You found him. You shall have the honour, for exhibiting such restraint until now. Jarl Halfdan nods to himself, pleased with the solution he’s proposed.
I turn aside from him, instead taking in the interior of the church, and looking for a chance to escape, even now. I count, in my head, the number of enemies arranged against me, feeling like Edmund, and I begin to appreciate just how fucking overwhelming the odds are.
There’s a flurry of activity around me as men are pushed aside, and others come closer, keen to see the fabled Lord Coelwulf before death.
I would grin at them all, and show them my bloodied teeth, but the fucking rag is still in my mouth.
Do they fear me so much that they must kill me both bound and gagged? Is my reputation really so fearful?
I hope so.
Yet my guard of black-clad warriors stays close, fending off those who become too inquisitive, and not calmly. The one with the green-eyes is particularly violent. When a warrior with a shining baldhead attempts to head butt me, the green-eyed warrior raises his elbow casually and smashes it into his nose. Blood flows, and I think it’ll only be the first such occurrence.
Leering faces swim in and out of my vision, and I stand tall, despite my shabby appearance. I’m a Mercian warrior, a man of royal birth. I’ve fought all my life for Mercian independence, both from Wessex and from the Raiders. While I face my death, I’ll show them what that means. I don’t believe they understand at all what being Mercian really involves.
Too soon, the Raiders are forced back, as Jarl Sigurd approaches me with a sharp blade in his hands. He wears a small smirk on his tight face, his steps almost jaunty and his blond moustache gleaming in the reflected glow from the fire.
The green-eyed warrior forces me to my knees. He might have sent the other man away with a bleeding nose so that he couldn’t harm me, but now he’s far from gentle, and I crash to the floor when he aims at the back of my legs with the end of his war axe. My entire body trembles and long-forgotten words of prayer form on my lips for the bastards haven’t provided me with the opportunity to confess my sins.
I knew this moment would come, and yet nothing has prepared me for it. Nothing.
Strange thoughts cascade through my mind, and yet
foremost of them all is the fact that I have fucking cold feet, and I hate having cold feet.
I fucking hate it.
A pair of boots strides into my restricted vision and how I envy those boots.
I don’t lookup. I don’t beg, and I don’t plead. I am resolved.
But fuck, my feet are bloody cold.
I wince, preparing for the killing blow, but I know it won’t come. How could it?
While ‘Jarl Sigurd’ steps close, Edmund with his green-eyes, and sure footing, steps even closer, his hand on the back of my head, as though to keep me in position. While his knife is busy at my ropes, Jarl Sigurd restricting the view of me from the front, and Hereman doing the same from the right-hand side.
My bound hands come free under cover of Edmund’s actions, and I hear his soft whistle of dismay at the state of my hands.
“Maybe they were too tight,” Edmund curses, as I feel the reassuring weight of iron being pressed into my hand. Still, I stay, head down, just waiting.
Icel has been forced to remain outside, his height and weight too obvious when he’s spoken to Jarl Anwend. In his place, Hereman serves me, alongside Edmund.
We wait, all three of us, the rest of the black-clad men as well.
I might have led my men here, but not all of them are in the church with me, and not all of them are my men. Others have chosen to accompany us. Warriors from all the ealdormen are represented. They’ve all sworn absolute loyalty to me, all of them making a vow that they would not watch me be killed by the enemy.
A vow that they would rather die than allow it. Most of them gave it eagerly. A few didn’t.
Now we’ll see how many of them can abide by that vow.
Jarl Sigurd, or rather, Wærwulf wearing his discarded equipment and suitable for the position because of us all, he spoke the best Danish, hesitates, his sword loose in his hand. I don’t meet his eyes, but rather wait.
It seems an interminable wait, but everything must be as we agreed before making this fucking foolhardy approach.
I see Wærwulf’s sword move, I feel it as a rush of disturbed air over my head, but his sword never drops to my neck, and that, finally, is my cue to stand and meet the faces of my enemy.
I do so slowly, not wishing to startle anyone more than I already am. I spit the rag from my mouth and taste the thick atmosphere, as I pull the binding down, showing that I’m no longer bound. The thick fug of smoke and sweat makes me cough.
Wærwulf grimaces at me, as he stands with his sword raised, only to pivot away from me on sprightly feet. From behind him, I catch sight of Jarl Anwend already moving, but not toward me, as he is the first to determine what’s really about to happen.
He’s not a fool. That might just save him and his son. I hope they never darken Mercian land again.
My seax glitters menacingly in the candlelight as I hold it in front of me, enjoying the slow look of triumph on Jarl Halfdan’s face turns to confusion and then drain entirely away. He’s not even noticed that Jarl Anwend and his son have gone.
Jarls Guthrum and Oscetel, stunned by Jarl Anwend’s quick movements, aren’t even watching me. I turn to meet the jubilant eyes of every one of the fifty men who’ve come with me into Repton.
I raise an eyebrow, and abruptly, a helm is thrown my way, a sword as well. Hereberht and Eoppa have hidden them for me. I incline my head to them, and the moment seems to stretch and drag, as though time has somehow changed and nothing is happening as quickly as I thought it would.
And then everything crashes back in on itself.
“Attack,” I bellow, and it begins.
I should like to take out one of the jarls, but Anwend has already gone, the screech of the door that leads into the interior of the fort opening and closing attesting to that, and actually, it’s not the jarls who threaten us, but rather their warriors.
They’ve been even slower to react than the jarls, and I watch with satisfaction as my fifty men sight a target, and strike them down without so much as a pause for thought. The first dead are the lucky ones. They don’t even have a chance to raise their weapons or piss themselves with fear.
The next men to fall will have more than enough time to consider their imminent death.
I join the rest of my men, our circle pushing outwards. I take the first man with a stab to his eye, the second, a sharp cut to his exposed neck, and the third, well I’m sure the daft fuck actually aims for the edge of my sword.
He dies quickly, and I’m stepping around him, cursing the requirement that I give up my boots to look ‘more like a prisoner.’ Blood squelches between my toes, and I fear I might slide and slip and then wound myself as poorly as the third of my kills.
I have no byrnie, but beneath my torn tunic, I’m wearing extra layers of cloth, and they account for the sweat that quickly flows.
“The door,” I holler, relieved when four warriors rush to stop anyone else from escaping into the wider enclosure outside St Wystan’s. I don’t want those outside alerted to what’s happening inside.
Jarl Anwend and his son took the door that leads into the protected area behind the church. I imagine they rush to a ship, with a bright sail because there won’t be the men to row, determined to make a quick getaway. I want that door as well, but it’s the one that leads outside Repton that worries me the most at the moment.
A warrior, his teeth gritted, slams into the side of me, and the foul bastard uses his initiative to stamp heavily on my naked foot.
“Fucking cunt,” I scream, so close to his face that he jerks away and that’s all I need. My seax at neck height, I jab out and slice cleanly through his cheek and out the other side. He squeals, and I mean squeals, and then I yank my seax back, a dollop of blackish blood landing on my tongue in the process. I think the fucker might have broken my toe.
I suck on the black blood, making my dying enemy watch, and then I turn away. He’s dead. He’s just not realised it yet. But fuck, my foot hurts.
I’m panting but no longer fearful, and Edmund is a whirling mass of blades, arms and feet. Whatever fear he might have had is gone. I duck quickly, keen to avoid the body of one of his kills as it rebounds from him.
“Careful you fucker,” I complain, and then I find another target.
This warrior is desperately trying to fight his way back through the mass of enemy who advances on us, wanting to avenge their comrades. Only his fellow warriors aren’t keen to let him through, not at all.
While he kicks and screams to be allowed into the protection of their mass, his back toward me, they thrust him onwards. I raise my seax once more to neck height and then stab down, the weapon grinding over the bones on his back. He falls, but his hands are grabbing, frantic to find a purchase on one of the other men, and as he tumbles, he brings two others down with him. It’s simple to stab them as well, exposed as they are.
I want to kick out, bring more of them to me, but my feet are still naked and slick with the blood of others. And I don’t have my boots, and my feet are fucking freezing, my toe throbbing from the bastard who stamped on it. If I could kill him again, I would.
I grin, knowing my teeth are smeared with blackened blood. More of them flinch away, until there’s nowhere else for them to go, for both doors are guarded.
“Dear me,” I speak with a smirk on my face. “Maybe you shouldn’t have come to witness this after all,” I comment, trying not to laugh at the terror on their faces or the pervading smell of piss that’s filling the air.
These men will die, and they know it.
My blades are busy then, as are those of my other warriors. I’m not the only one to duck away from Edmund. He fights with all of his skill and without a genuine appreciation of who surrounds him. The battle lust has well and truly claimed him.
As I take the life of enemy after enemy, the blows all different, the end result always the same, I swerve out of Edmund’s way time and time again, until Hereman, with all the familiarity of a brother, roars at him.
“W
atch what you’re doing you fucking bastard.”
Only then does Edmund seem to come to, aware for the first time of what he’s doing, and he smiles. I’ve never seen such a terrible smile, and I hope to never do so again.
Edmund pounds his bloodied chest, and raises his weapons in front of him, as though making an offering to the pagan gods. The roar that erupts from his mouth brings dust raining down from the rafters.
“Fucking hell,” I complain, sneezing and fighting at the same time, blinking dust from my eyes, and spitting it clear from my mouth.
Only when I have nothing to attack but the walls of the building, do I pause again, turn and survey the terrible scene before me.
There are dead and dying men everywhere, and I mean everywhere.
Some have attempted to crawl away, trailing their innards in their wake. Others have curled around their pain, trying to drive it away. Others still stand, not understanding the wounds they’ve taken are lethal, while they cup body parts and watch blood pool through their fingers.
And then there are those that I count as friends or allies. Their deaths tear at me, for all I know they came willingly. Not a single man here was coerced into fighting for Mercia. Not a single one.
“Where are the fuckers?”
Now that every warrior in the church has been slain, it’s time to hunt down the others who did manage to escape.
I want to find the jarls. I want to personally take their lives, although I think it impossible. I’m sure, like Jarl Anwend, that all four of the men must have escaped before we could seal the doors.
Now, is the time for us all to work together. The time for single-combat is gone.
We have no shields, those items being left with the horses that brought us here, but the church has tables. Wærwulf, still wearing Jarl Sigurd’s battle gear, and Ælfgar are busy dismantling one of them. We don’t need the legs, but we do need the wood. I can see where they’ve flung bodies aside, and the wood gleams wetly. I know it’s not with water.
“Are we ready?” I turn, keen to ensure my men have caught their breaths and can continue. Not a single one of them shouts for me to wait, even though many are gasping in great lungful’s of air. Others see to injuries of a friend, and a few others just stare, as though perplexed by the success of the endeavour.
