“Yes, yes, tell Aelfgar my prayers are with my father and I’ll need no more news in that regard,” Cynewise said, gesturing toward the door of the tent. The servant nodded, bowed, and backed away, a puzzled look on his thin face.
“You father, ma’am, is ill?” Oswin asked.
“He’ll be fine,” Cynewise said. “A stomach ailment that troubles him from time to time.”
“I see,” Oswin said.
“As I was saying,” Cynewise continued. “We have men looking for Nothwulf, and when he’s found, and when we have the men back who were taken at Christchurch, and the damned Northmen are gone, then we’ll see to him and be done with all of this.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Oswin said. “Nothwulf’s army must be near. The heathens themselves expect him to attack.”
“I pray he’ll fling his men at the heathens,” Cynewise said. “It could rid us of two nuisances and save me one hundred and fifty pounds of silver. But my guess is that Nothwulf is too great a coward to fight, so we’ll have no choice but to pay them off. So, go now.”
“Yes, m’lady,” Oswin said, bowed, and then signaled to the guards outside the tent to enter. They grabbed the handles of the iron-bound chest and lifted it with more difficulty than seemed appropriate for a relatively small box, then carried it out.
“Aelfwyn,” Cynewise called, still staring at the door through which Oswin had gone, and in a heartbeat Aelfwyn was standing beside her.
“Ma’am?”
Cynewise remained silent for a moment, her mind still working. Then she said, “In Sherborne, you played the little whore for Nothwulf, and you did it well.”
Aelfwyn said nothing to that, and after a moment’s silence Cynewise looked up at her. “Well?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Aelfwyn said at last, apparently not appreciating the compliment.
“Do you think you could get in his good graces again? Use your…charms?”
“Oh, ma’am, I wouldn’t think so,” Aelfwyn said. “Nothwulf found me out, took me as his prisoner. I was treated terribly, ma’am.”
“Hmm,” Cynewise said. “Well, we’ll see. There may still be some opportunity there. But for now, pray see my bed is made ready. It’s been a trying day and I’m quite ready to retire.”
The bed, an oak frame cleverly made to come apart for ease of transport, supporting a fine, down-filled mattress, was made ready. Aelfwyn helped Cynewise into her sleeping clothes and soon Ealdorman Cynewise was sleeping the good sleep of the innocent.
The gray light of dawn was illuminating the tent, but just barely, when she woke to Aelfwyn, who was gently shaking her shoulder.
“What?” Cynewise snapped, but the word came out more like a croak and she cleared her throat irritably.
“It’s Oswin, ma’am, the shire reeve…”
“I know who Oswin is, you idiot,” Cynewise said, her voice now its proper tone and pitch.
“Oswin’s outside, ma’am, and he would speak to you.”
Cynewise scowled. The damned shire reeve had something so important to say that he had to wake her at such an hour? She could not imagine. She was about to send him away when the fog of sleep cleared a bit more and she realized he might indeed have something important enough for such a transgression.
“Very well,” Cynewise said, tossing her silk blanket aside. “Get me my cape and then send him in.”
By the time Oswin stepped into the tent, a scowl on his face, Cynewise was seated on her throne-like chair, her embroidered cape around her shoulders, half-covering her sleeping gown, her shoes and stockings on her feet.
“Oswin? What news? ” Cynewise asked.
“I rode to Christchurch Priory, ma’am,” Oswin said. “Off to pay the danegeld, see that the heathens bugger off, and I come on Nothwulf’s army.”
“Indeed?” Cynewise said. “Where?”
“Christchurch Priory,” Oswin said and Cynewise felt her stomach sink. If Nothwulf had defeated the heathens in battle he would come off as the savior of Dorsetshire, and she could not allow that. It was why she was willing to pay the Northmen to make them go away. But now it seemed she was too late, that Nothwulf had already won his victory.
“Have they…” she began, but Oswin cut her off.
“Seems the heathens abandoned the priory and set up some sort of defense on the beach,” he said. “And Nothwulf has them surrounded. Which means there’s four hundred or more of Nothwulf’s damned men-at-arms between us and the damned Northmen.”
Cynewise nodded. She was not entirely surprised. She knew that Nothwulf and his army were somewhere in the area, and it made sense that he would be where the enemy was. As much as she despised Nothwulf, considered him weak-minded and feckless, and was happy to refer to him as a coward, still she did not actually doubt his dedication and his courage. She had to keep that in mind, because nothing could lead to ruin quicker than underestimating one’s enemy.
“Four hundred men-at-arms between us and the heathens,” she said softly. It was not a question and Oswin knew better than to make reply. She was thinking now, and it helped to voice those thoughts. Four hundred men-at-arms. That was very bad. Or very good. It would be up to her to see which it was.
“Well, we can’t pay the Northmen to leave, not now,” Cynewise said, addressing Oswin this time. “We’ll look like cowards doing that, with Nothwulf there and ready to fight. Hell, we can’t even get to the heathens, with Nothwulf surrounding them. We’ll have to join him in fighting those whore’s sons. But we must be leading the thing, or seeming to.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Oswin said. “But if we drive the Northmen off, our men and Nothwulf’s drive them off, then we find ourselves just where we are now. Stalemate.”
“Perhaps,” Cynewise said. “It will depend on how the battle plays out. There’s danger here, but opportunity as well.” She fell silent, staring vaguely at the ground on which Oswin stood. Oswin, she knew, would wait patiently. They had had dealings enough that the reeve knew when to shut up and let her consider the next move. Finally she looked up.
“Horsa!” she snapped and the servant named Horsa who had been standing at Cynewise’s side, half asleep on his feet, snapped awake.
“Ma’am?”
“How does my father?” Cynewise had instructed Horsa to visit her father’s tent on and off through the night and get the news as to his health.
“Not well, ma’am, but his servants are hopeful. He’s a strong man, even at his age, and he seems to be past the worst of it.”
“Good to hear. Pray send them word that I would have my father attend me here.” To Cynewise’s further irritation she heard Horsa shuffle his feet a bit and she turned in her chair to glare at him.
“Well, ma’am, I can bring word, but his men, I think they’ll object, begging your pardon. They’ll say his lordship ain’t strong enough to move.”
Cynewise glared at the servant for a moment longer, then let out a long sigh of exasperation, a tone that suggested all the burdens of the world invariably fell on her shoulders.
“Very well,” she said, “I’ll go to him, if I must.” But it was worth it, she knew. In that moment, staring at Oswin’s boots, she had seen how this all might play out if handled right. It was worth the trouble of talking to a sick old man.
Chapter Ten
I sing to thee the second,
as thou hast to wander
joyless on thy ways.
The Poetic Edda
Nearly four hundred Northmen were crammed into a half-moon fortification two hundred feet long and a hundred feet wide at its widest part and pressed against the bank of the river. Six of their seven ships were floating in the shallow water, tethered to the shore by lines run over their bows and made fast to anchors set in the soft dirt. The seventh ship rode at anchor one hundred feet out in the river with two hundred English prisoners crammed miserably aboard.
The Northmen had no shelter to speak of, no means of provisioning, save for the food and drink they had with them on the sh
ore and aboard the ships. They were surrounded by a powerful army lurking just out of range of their arrows and spears. How large an army they did not know, but large enough to completely envelope the makeshift log walls of the longphort. They had no reason to doubt that an attack would come at any moment, and if it did, it could well end in bloody defeat.
And yet the Northmen were jubilant, celebrating with the sort of abandon for which their kind was famous.
They were well-on drunk. Barrels of ale and mead and even wine were stacked on the ground, and as quickly as one was drained the head of another was stove in. The priory at Christchurch, stripped bare now, had been well-stocked when Thorgrim’s fleet arrived. Thorgrim had been generous in doling out the food to the townsfolk who had lent a hand in building the walls—there was far more in the storehouses than he and his men could carry away—but he was more parsimonious with the drink. He did not want the townsfolk to gain the courage found in ale and mead. That would only lead to trouble. And he did not want to deny his men the thing that they most desired, far more than the salt meat and fish and bread that they also took with them.
The ale and mead and wine had been flowing since just after hádegi, midday. A big fire was built on the dirt and the men sat around it and they sang and they laughed and they dipped their cups in the stove-in barrels and drank some more.
They drank in recognition of the feat they had pulled off, one which the skalds would sing about for generations. How, under the command of Thorgrim Night Wolf, a man whose fame was spreading like the light at dawn, they had built a longphort in a single night and confounded their enemy once again. They drank to the plunder that was stored down under the deck boards of their ships, and to the two hundred prisoners who would bring them even greater riches, either ransomed for silver or sold as slaves.
They drank because they had ale and mead to drink and they drank because they liked to drink.
Thorgrim made no protest. The men had earned this. He was proud of them and happy to let them indulge. He did not think the enemy would come that night, or perhaps ever. The walls of the longphort were not high, and they were no marvels of construction, but they were built of heavy logs and timber, and the ground before them was strewn with debris that would be a nightmare to cross in the dark. And if any managed to make it through those haphazard obstructions they would have to scale the walls in the face of wild, drunk Northmen wielding swords, axes and spears.
He had lookouts posted, sober men standing on the walls, but he did not think the enemy would come. So he sat with his men by the fire and celebrated along with them.
Failend was not celebrating. She was off toward the western end of the longphort, hidden by shadow, sitting on a short length of log, staring out into the dark. She was about as far from the fire as she could get in that place, which was not very far, a hundred feet or so. Her thoughts, however, had stayed so far afield she might as well have been in Frankia, or back in her native Ireland.
For three days now she had shunned Thorgrim’s bed, gone off to sleep by herself in some corner of the priory. And he had said nothing about it. She was not even sure he noticed.
Damn him, damn him… she thought. And her next thought was, Well, what in the name of God did you expect?
Thorgrim Night Wolf had never pledged his love to her. Had never made any promises, had, in truth, never pursued her at all. She had gone to him, crawled into his bed, lain with him. Nearly a year before. Did she really think he or any man would object to her giving herself to him, would decline her advances? She was very attractive to men and she knew it. Did she think that fornicating with a heathen would lead to his loving her?
“Yes,” she said out loud. Yes, she had thought that. Or hoped it, anyway. A half-formed, unexamined thought, one that would not bear up to scrutiny. But yes, she had thought that Thorgrim would love her.
Because she loved him. It was never her intention, or even a thought in her head at first. Her life had been turned upside down at Glendalough. No, not just turned upside down. It had been shredded like a banner flying in a gale, torn to ribbons and remade into something she did not recognize. She had gone from her numbing existence as wife to an old, wealthy man, a woman who tried to satisfy her undefined yearning by bedding various men, to what she was now.
Which is what?
A killer. She had killed her husband, killed men in battle. Put arrows through them, which was easy. Driven the point of her seax into their guts, which was not quite so easy, either for her arm or her conscience. She had killed Christians. In the service of heathens she had put Christians in their graves.
Sharing Thorgrim’s bed had been a part of all the madness. Thorgrim Night Wolf was a mystery, a danger, a thrill. That was how it had started for her. Thorgrim was just part of the wild abandon, the insane recklessness into which she had voluntarily leapt. She told herself that she would not fall in love with him. And she believed it. Thorgrim was a heathen, and if he was attractive in an animal sort of way he was also vicious and brutal, thoughtless in his cruelty.
But actually he was not. She had assumed that all Northmen were like that, and she found that some were, but Thorgrim was not. He was not a mindless predator; he was more complicated than that. He was intriguing to her. And he was desirable. Very desirable. Of course love would grow in that soil.
And now, through the smoke of love and madness, the truth was starting to appear. She had become a heathen and a killer, and she loved a man who did not care if she slept with him or not.
How would he feel if I bedded another? she wondered. She had no intention of doing so, she just wondered if Thorgrim cared enough to be angry or jealous.
She did not hear the steps on the soft ground, and the voice was soft, but it surprised her nonetheless.
“Pensive tonight.” It was not a question, but a statement.
Failend looked up. The figure was only a dark outline, backlit by the fire, but she recognized the shape of the man. And even if she had not, there was no mistaking the voice. There was no one among all of them who had so odd an accent as Louis de Roumois.
“Mmm,” Failend said. No words came to mind. Her thoughts were twisting like eddies of wind. She wanted to be left alone, and she welcomed Louis’s company, all at the same time.
For a moment they remained silent, and Failend guessed that Louis was looking at her as she was looking at him, but she still could not see his face.
“You may as well sit,” she said, nodding toward the unoccupied section of log.
“Thank you, I will,” he said, stepping past her. Failend realized they were speaking in Irish, Failend’s native tongue and the one Louis had used for the past year or more, a language they shared. It sounded odd to her now.
She had been speaking only the Northmen’s language for some time. Even when they had been in Ireland, she had little call to speak Irish after she had joined with Thorgrim’s band. Instead, she had stumbled along in Norse until she grew more adept with that tongue.
The same was true for Louis, but he, like Failend, was still more comfortable in Irish. He sat and they did not speak and Failend remembered that that was something she liked about Louis. Talkative as he could be, he could also be silent, and be comfortable in the silence. Silence was not something Failend enjoyed very often in the midst of several hundred Northmen.
“You’ve not been with Thorgrim of late,” Louis observed at last.
“You’ve been watching me?”
“I see things. A leader of men must be aware of all things around him. Of course, I don’t lead so much as a flock of sheep anymore. But it’s an old habit.”
Failend did not reply. She had no intention of discussing with Louis her relationship with Thorgrim. She was not even sure she could discuss it with herself. But there were other things.
“We’re Christians,” she said. “We were Christians. I suppose we still are. Does it bother you, Louis, to help these heathens?”
She could not see him in the dark, but, k
nowing Louis, she was quite certain that he had shrugged his shoulders. “These heathen Northmen have tried to kill me, the Irish Christians have tried to kill me. The English have tried to kill me. I don’t feel much love for any of them. Now, I think of myself just as a Frank.”
“Didn’t the Franks try to kill you?” Failend asked, and she heard a short chuckle in reply.
“No,” Louis said. “My brother wished to kill me, but he didn’t dare. Instead he sent me to the monastery in Glendalough where he hoped I might die of boredom. And I almost did.”
“I was dying of boredom in Glendalough, too,” Failend said. “That’s why we took to entertaining each other.”
“I recall,” Louis said. “You’re not bored now, are you?”
“No,” Failend said. “Not bored. Confused.”
“You love Thorgrim,” Louis said. “You don’t know if he loves you.”
“No,” Failend said, the word more emphatic than she had intended. “Yes. I don’t know. You’re lucky, you know. You know what you want to do. Get back to Frankia, avenge yourself against your brother. You have a purpose, for what it’s worth. Me, I’m drifting, like a boat that’s been pushed out into the water.”
“I don’t feel terribly lucky,” Louis said.
They sat in silence a while longer. There was a bond between them, Failend could feel it. They had been lovers. They had been soldiers together, and outlaws and prisoners of the Northmen. They had been strangers in the heathens’ camp and they had become part of Thorgrim’s army, each in their own way. And yet they were still strangers there, the two odd ones, the ones who did not hear the song of Odin and Thor.
“You could speak to Thorgrim, you know,” Louis said at last. “He’s not an unreasonable man.”
“He tried to kill you,” Failend said. “Several times.”
“That’s how I know he’s not unreasonable.”
Failend smiled. “He does not want to hear from me and my petty worries. He has worries enough. I’d look like a complete fool, talking to him about the things that are troubling me. Silly girlish things.”
Kings and Pawns Page 10
