by M J Porter
The Last Sword
The Ninth Century Book V
M J Porter
M J Publishing
Copyright © 2021 M J Porter
Copyright notice
Porter, M J The Last Sword
Copyright ©2021, Porter, M J Amazon Edition
All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent buyer.
Cover design by MJ Porter
Cover image by Dreamstime ID 150147192 © Tomert. Dreamstime.com.
ISBN (ebook) 978-1-914332-32-6
ISBN (paperback) 978-1-914332-33-3
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Map
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Cast of Characters
Meet the author
Map
Prologue
Before me, Icel is forced down on one knee, overextending his right arm, almost losing his balance on the slick surface. With him grounded, Jarl Halfdan darts forward over the grey and white ground ferociously stabbing downwards. I expect Icel to counter the attack with his bloodied seax or his sword. But he must carry a wound that bleeds copiously, draining strength from him. His movements are too slow, and Halfdan lifts a bloodied blade, a smile of pleasure on his ugly face at such an easy ending, the scar that mars his face showing between the hints of growing daylight and dancing flame.
“Don’t you fucking dare,” I bellow, my voice so loud it resounds like thunder, distracting Halfdan from the final cut, as intended, despite the battle that rages all around us.
With that respite, brief as it is, Icel has the time to recover himself, staggering upwards, while Halfdan faces me, a look of displeasure on his broad face. I can see his tactic now.
He means to deprive me of my warriors, one by one, isolating me, making me weak. It’s good he started with Icel, a man who will never die easily.
Only, it seems he didn’t.
Inserting myself between Icel and Halfdan, I realise that another warrior is sprawled on the snow drenched floor, the back of his head far too familiar to me. He better fucking live; that’s all I have the time to think before Halfdan surges against me.
I thought him too craven to face me one to one once more. But that’s not the case.
Halfdan’s movements are supple and fluid, and he advances with the ease of a much younger man, but one assured of success.
He carries a seax and a war axe, although there’s a sword available to him as well, the handle visible above his black helm, held tightly to his back. I thought my last kill had the eyes of death. Halfdan has the eyes of a confident warrior, knowing, watchful, eager. They promise death, and that’s an entirely different proposition.
Hereman and Sæbald have helped Icel to either side, but he’s not happy about it, even as he holds his hands against a weeping wound to the left of his body; the red-hue a dark stain that won’t stop growing.
“He’s mine, My Lord. He’s fucking mine,” he rants. It’s not like Icel to be so bloody stubborn. He, of all my men, is more than aware when he’s beaten.
Halfdan and I both menace with our seaxs. I feel the double eagle-head against the hardness of my gloves. His seax, I note, carries the emblem of the wolf, cold blue eyes peering from the handle, the disdain hard to ignore even from an immobile object.
And then we spring at one another, his seax goes high, mine low. Yet we both move aside, avoiding the cuts. For now.
I follow up with a similar swipe low with my weapon, and this time he goes low as well. Our seaxs clash, shimmering sunlight striking at just the right moment to make it appear as though sparks fly. I smell his rancid sweat, as close as we are, and I feel his strength. It matches mine. For now.
Face to face, I trace the line of his jaw, just visible beneath a yellow beard festooned with trinkets; so many of them they clack together as his head shudders with the effort of keeping me at bay. His scar is still there. It offers its own story.
In my other hand, I hold my war axe, and I’d like nothing more than to swing it at his head, but all of my strength centres on my seax. Whoever gives first will be the weaker of us. It’s not going to be fucking me.
He’s muttering to himself, his words unintelligible, either a chant or a similar refrain. Perhaps he calls on something otherworldly to beat me. I wouldn’t be surprised. I trust in my skill, my strength, my ability, and if that’s ever failed me, which it hasn’t, I know my warriors will step in. They rescued me when I was outside Northampton. They saved me from the woodlands. They will always rescue me. I doubt Jarl Halfdan has the same assurance from his baying warriors.
The fighting all around us has ground to a stop, an uneasy truce. After all, why would men risk their lives when there might be no need to in but a few moments?
I eye his sword peering at me from over his shoulder. The leering wolf face, picked out in heavy silver, earns a grin from my straining face. I could take it right now. I could kill the fucker with that blade, end his life with the same item that has saved him on too many previous occasions.
I feel his stance start to falter, the tension on his face causing spittle to fly with his chanting, and I hold, press that little bit harder, aware I’ve not given everything, not yet.
And Halfdan breaks aside, panting heavily, his eyes showing fury as he skips backwards. I don’t give him the time he needs to recover. He wouldn’t offer me the same.
I launch myself at him, only realising by the flash of relief on his face that this is what he wants me to do. My war axe swings wide, and I thrust it to clash against his right side. His black leather byrnie holds, for now, but he loses balance. Halfdan might think to play with me, pretending to weakness when he’s strong, but a particular blow will always show the truth of the matter.
Now that I’ve considered his enticing sword, I want it. I need to feel the weight in my hand and delight in slicing through his chest with it, or across his throat, or preferably, right through the fucker’s skull, watching his bright eyes turn dull with the finality of it all.
His seax stabs out at me, and I force it aside with my war axe, swiping it across my body to do so. At the same time, I slash with my seax, first blood welling on part of his chin where his beard is shorn away by the stroke. A yelp of outrage disturbs his continual invocation, and again, he jumps away from me, feet light, even if he’s using up all of his resources to stay alive.
Icel rants from behind me, his rumbles showing anger, rage, fury and impotence all at the same time.
“Take him, take him now, kill the fucker, use your seax, across his neck, don’t just give the bastard a shave,” and I roll my eyes at the instructions. Icel. Always so fucking
helpful in such situations.
“Shut the fuck up,” Edmund menaces, his words flecked with fury, but actually, Icel is doing some of the work for me, even while he struggles to catch his breath and regain his equilibrium. I can tell that Halfdan expects me to carry out Icel’s instructions. It’s evident in the way he moves to protect his neck, chin down. Better to lose his trinkets and beard than risk his neck. So, all I need to do is the opposite.
Icel, a canny bastard, even when he is being a bastard.
“His belly, slice open his belly.” So I aim for Halfdan’s seax arm, again, a welter of blood showing where he thinks to wear no protection but his wolf tattoos. I blind the beast—one less set of eyes to judge me silently.
“His thigh, stab into it.” So I stab upwards, aiming for the area below his armpit, a notorious weakness that not even the toughest byrnie can protect. I miss it, but a flicker of consternation passes Halfdan’s face. Will he be warier now?
“His neck,” Icel screams; there’s no other word for it.
“Shut the fuck up,” Edmund bellows in response. The two will come to blows if I don’t hurry up.
I slash down with my seax, cutting through the thick leather that protects my foe’s calves, leaving part of it flapping free as he dances from my attack.
The Raiders are sullen in the encouragement of their jarl. Again, the words rumble from them, perhaps a battle chant, and I appreciate that they’re creating a rhythm to guide Halfdan’s blows.
He aims for my face, no doubt keen to repay the assault on his chin. I veer from the attack, offering my elbow as payment.
Halfdan’s face is increasingly pinker, finally warming up after days of cold temperatures. His body is growing more limber, his actions more fluid. Yet, blood drips from his chin, landing on the churned snow, our passage back and forth, side to side, spreading it far and wide.
It looks as though I’ve slaughtered a pig and not just given someone an overly close shave.
“Take his right hand,” Icel instructs, the fury still in his voice at being withheld from the attack, but I appreciate the lessening of tension. He knows exactly what’s happening. Did he plan it, or have I taken it that he did, and now both of us will claim it as our victory?
Will this become one of Icel’s oft recounted tales.
“In the reign of King Coelwulf?”
I slash at Halfdan’s left leg, opening up a lesion above his knee. The blow doesn’t quite strike true, or he’d be fighting with a broken knee.
Fuck.
While I’m low, his war axe passes over my head, a soft ding showing his aim was almost true, although my helm stays firm. I need to be careful. He might be growing weaker, but Halfdan is also starting to read the attack better.
I rush into him, war axe angled at his chest, his eyes reflecting rage, his chest rising and falling. He attempts to evade the action but tangles his legs before slipping in the growing mass of splattered blood decorating the ground. He bleeds from two places now. Neither a mortal wound, but I’m just fucking beginning.
And then his seax slicks into my lower arm, just above where I hold my war axe, and a hot spike surges up my arm. Now, he’s drawn blood as well, although he doesn’t know that because my glove absorbs the tell-tale sign. I don’t react, even though a lesser man might.
But, Halfdan does sense something all the same because he comes at me, seax flashing, war axe looming, a flurry of strikes against me, although not one of them makes it beyond the guard of my seax and war axe.
Damn the fucker. He has the upper hand. For now.
I dodge and slash, turning, swirling, ducking low, rearing back, mindful of my steps on the slick ground, aware that Icel continues to holler but that I can’t hear his words, not while my ears rush with the thrill of trying to evade my enemy. I’ve dreamt of killing Halfdan since the summer. This is my chance. I’m not going to fuck it up.
Seax arm up, war axe arm low, I keep up with his speeding attack. Then I get lucky, another slick on his chin, and more of the trinkets from his blond beard tumble to the ground, crushed beneath my advance. He bleeds more, this cut deeper, revealing the promise of bone beneath the flap of pale skin. I sense his fury and frustration, but most of all, his pain.
He can’t hide it. Not as I am.
I follow up with a mighty blow against his right side with the war axe, but it only skitters over his byrnie. I’m forced to tense my arm to bring the action back under control.
Halfdan senses an opening, and he thrusts his war axe against my seax arm, and it hits home, my hand fleeing open because he’s managed to hit, somehow, that part of my arm that tingles and brings about the uncontrollable response. My seax thumps to the floor, ringing too loudly of failure. I finally hear Icel’s words, as opposed to just his noise.
“Shoulder, back, shoulder, neck,” Icel’s not the only one to be shouting. I detect Rudolf’s higher tones, and I slash downwards, aiming for ankle and foot. Only Halfdan is too fast, and he jumps clear, turning the movement into an advance, his seax running down my bent back, even though it doesn’t pierce the leather.
Instead of rushing to stand upright, I swing my war axe again, eyes focused on where my seax has surely tumbled into the churned and reddened snow. But I don’t see it, although my axe digs into Halfdan’s flesh once more. It’s only a glancing blow. I’m starting to think he wears some sort of protective equipment designed to evade all but the most direct of blows.
When I stand upright, his seax is almost on my nose, and he’s standing too close as well. I’m thankful for my helm, then. I twist my neck, bring up my seaxless hand, and bang his seax aside with just my glove. The weapon cuts deeper this time, forcing the earlier cut deeper and wider, but the blood remains hidden.
“Bastard,” I offer. Halfdan has two weapons, and I only have one.
“Hold,” Icel calls. I take his advice, rushing Halfdan, war axe swirling, fist punching, landing on his chin wound so that my hand comes away bloodied this time, but at least it covers where he’s drawn blood.
He howls, eyes glazed with pain, and I continue. Slashing, punching, threatening to head butt, and Halfdan steps back, once, twice, and then more and more, so that his warriors are forced to part ways as he all but runs away. Halfdan’s almost back inside the ruin of the steading he sheltered within.
The chanting of his warriors intensifies, and while I think I’ve done a good job of revealing his weaknesses, he’s suddenly running at me, weapons just on the verge of under his control. Slashing, hacking, and now I’m the one moving back to avoid the frenzy.
And my foot catches on something in the ground. I think it might be my damn seax. My arms spiralling, the air leaves my body. I’m down on the floor, the wet snow and warm blood seeping into my clothes, as my chin bounces on my chest, and for a frantic moment, I can see two of everything. Two of Halfdan, two of his seaxs, two of his war axes, and four of his arms.
I hear a collective gasp from my warriors, well, all apart from Icel.
“Get up, get up,” he rails, and I think he’s crazy this time, but I stay low, listening to Halfdan’s cackle, his mouth wide open, his gaping wound a mockery of the same smile. He menaces me with wavering seaxs and war axes. He thinks his actions keep me on the ground, but they don’t. I’ve seen what tripped me, and it was my damn seax, for two of them waver before me.
I reach for them both, eyes on Halfdan, not my blades, and I crush it in my hand, unheeding that it’s landed upside down, and blood pools between my fingers once more. The discomfort brings the moment back into sharp focus. Once more, I see only one of everything.
Halfdan aims a swipe at my head. I duck even lower, scurrying forwards in the snow so that I rear up behind him, fully armed once more, despite the injuries I now carry.
I bend my knees, mindful of the ache of cold and age, only to jump high, reach for the sword in its baldric with my seax hand. Just as my fingers brush the air above it, he turns, wrathful. The sword is loose, though. It tumbles to the f
loor, out of my reach, and more importantly, out of his.
His war axe looms at me, coming for my throat, my chest, my belly, each swipe just about missing me as I dodge, back and down, and then up and forward, trying to insert my war axe between his and mine. I release it in the air, catch it lower down the broad wooden handle, thrusting the bottom of the war axe into his bleeding face, his shorn beard and bloodied chin.
Halfdan’s eyes blank, just for a moment. It’s all I need. I’m rushing around him, eyes keen for the prize of his sword, half-buried in the snow. But before I can get my seax hand to it, I feel the unmissable ache of cold iron at my throat, and I still, hand extended, war axe facing down.
The bite of the iron comes ever closer, the reminder of my last injury making it difficult to swallow or breathe or consider moving.
Fuck, the bastard has me. He’ll kill me, here and now, even though I’m fully armed, and his sword is almost within reach.
Silence reverberates, not even Icel offering his advice. I close my eyes, picture my stern Aunt’s look of horror, the glimmer of anger on Edmund’s face, and the dismay that Pybba will wear.
This is it.
I thought to die before, protecting my warriors, protecting Mercia. But now it seems Jarl Halfdan is to have the last bastard word after all.
Chapter 1
Two weeks earlier
I grit my teeth, try not to glare at the shit storm taking place in front of me.
I wish I could dance and generally make a complete arse of myself like the rest of my men. But I can’t. Not now. And it’s beginning to feel as though I might never again.
“Leave it alone.” A sharp slap on my hand forces my fingers away from the hot and itching wound that almost decapitated me.
“It,” and I pause, silently say the word that should come next, instead. “Itches,” I finish. My Aunt turns her steel eyes toward me. She’s dressed as every inch the aunt of the king. Her clothing is immaculate, her nails clean, her hair neatly braided and held beneath a small wimple that speaks of practicality, not wealth in its simplicity.
