The Midgard Serpent

by James L. Nelson

  “Why not?”

  “If folk think a man’s a hero, then the worst thing he can do is start believing it himself,” Thorgrim said.

  “And you told Harald he was no hero?”

  “I did.”

  “And did he believe you?”

  “No,” Thorgrim said. “And that worries me.”

  A familiar smell came playing around Thorgrim’s nose, the smell of roasting whale, and he realized that he was hungry. He looked down at Failend. “Looks like it’s whale again. Can I fetch you some?”

  “Thank you,” Failend said as she stood easily from her cross-legged position. “But I will get some for you, and some ale as well.” She tucked her comb into a small leather bag that hung from her belt, snatched up two wooden plates and two cups and headed off toward where the cooking fires were burning. Thorgrim watched her walk away.

  She’s in good humor, he thought. He had seen her moods change from cheerful to melancholy to angry and back again. He knew there must be a great tangle of thoughts and feelings churning around in her head, but he could not fathom what they might be.

  Soon she was back with food and drink. They sat side by side on a driftwood log and ate, while the men of the two fleets, a formidable army of more than five hundred warriors, woke, stretched, urinated, scratched, ate and drank as they started their day.

  They were nearly finished when Bergthor approached, smiling as he seemed always to be. “Thorgrim, good morning! Good morning, Failend!” Thorgrim looked up, but Bergthor’s eyes were lingering on Failend, not him.

  “Good morning, Bergthor,” Thorgrim said and Bergthor turned his gaze quickly, with something of a guilty look on his face.

  Been some time since you’ve been with a woman, is it? Thorgrim thought.

  “Thorgrim, much as I’d like to spend my life on this beach drinking mead and eating whale, I guess we’d better do something more worthwhile. I was hoping we could have a gathering of all the ship masters this morning, figure what comes next.”

  Thorgrim nodded. Bergthor seemed to believe that they had joined up now, their two fleets, but he was getting a little ahead of himself.

  “That would be fine,” Thorgrim said.

  Bergthor had his men arrange driftwood logs in a circle big enough for them all to sit, and when they were done all the ships’ masters were asked to come together. Thorgrim did not invite Harald because Harald was not the master of a ship anymore. And he did not invite Herjolf because, despite what he said, he was not sure that Herjolf had it in him to command a ship, nor did he care what Herjolf had to say. But that could all be straightened out later.

  Starri Deathless was there, of course, but Bergthor did not question that. Bergthor, too, had one man extra — a fellow who did not look like the master of a ship, or even a Northman, but Thorgrim did not ask.

  “Very well,” Bergthor began in a faltering way. “We should…that is, I think…perhaps we should talk about what’s next.”

  Thorgrim smiled, just a bit. Back in Agder, Thorgrim, son of Ulf of the Battle Song, son-in-law of Ornolf the Restless, was a well-known, prosperous and important man. Far more so than Bergthor Skeggjason, who was liked and respected, but held no position of importance. Even without considering his bloodline, Thorgrim had a reputation as a warrior that was second to none, and great wealth besides. The relative status that the two men enjoyed back home had been transferred to this beach in the south of Engla-land, it seemed, and Bergthor was loath to take command with Thorgrim there.

  “I think we better do that, Bergthor,” Thorgrim said. “I can tell you, for us, what our plans were when we met up with you. We were sailing home. We were making for Norway, nothing more. Done with raiding.” Thorgrim had explained all this to Bergthor earlier, but he repeated it now for the other ships’ masters. And for his own men, in case they had lost sight of his intentions.

  “I’ve been years away from home,” Thorgrim continued, “as have many of those with me. Time to return.”

  “Well, it’s the opposite with us!” Bergthor said with enthusiasm. “We’re not done plundering these English bastards! We’ve hardly started. This fellow here,” he continued, pointing to the odd man in his party, “this fellow is named Geldwine, he’s the one I told you about. A Briton, speaks our language, has no love of the Saxons. He’s a fisherman hereabouts. Knows these waters, and the towns, too. Geldwine, tell Thorgrim and the rest where we’re going.”

  Geldwine nodded, though he did not seem like a very talkative sort. “Just to the west of here,” he said, “there’s a great bay. Looks more like a river but it’s not, though several rivers run into it. At the head of the bay is a village called Hamtun. A church and an abbey there. Big ones, rich ones. But the real wealth’s to the north, a place called Winchester. It’s there the king lives.”

  Heads nodded, Bergthor’s men and Thorgrim’s. “This Winchester,” Godi said. “We can get there in our ships?”

  Geldwine shook his head. “Winchester’s about thirty miles from Hamtun, but there’s a good road, a road built by the ancient people. A day or two’s march, if you march hard. Might even find some horses about.”

  “A king’s court, it could be well defended,” Bergthor said. He glanced around at the men who sailed under him. “But we’re willing to give it a try. Hit them fast and hard, be gone before any of the other men-at-arms are summoned from the country around. It could be risky, of course. But now…” He let the words hang in the air.

  Now you’ve doubled your number of fighting men, Thorgrim thought. And if this Winchester was as rich as Geldwine suggested there would still be plunder enough to satisfy them all.

  He looked around at his own men. They were paying attention, sitting upright, eyes on Bergthor, listening. Some were still nodding. Starri was trying to contain his excitement.

  Thorgrim had assumed that, like himself, they all wanted to get back to Norway, back to their homes, though he had never actually spoken to any of them about it. Louis certainly made no secret that his only desire was to get back to Frankia, not that Thorgrim cared what Louis wanted. As to the others, Thorgrim realized he had no idea how they felt.

  How many here have been with me since we sailed from Agder? he wondered. Not many. Vali and Armod. Harald, of course. A handful of others. Even Godi and Starri Deathless had only joined with him after he had been some time in Ireland.

  It did not matter. He was going home. He was done with raiding. He would take Sea Hammer and Blood Hawk and sail for home with any who wished to join him. Any who did not could have the other four ships and do with them what they wished. But he was done.

  Starri spoke next. “The gods must wish it, that we come with you,” he said, looking at Bergthor. “They put you right in our path, and sent Harald after the whale so we would meet up.”

  Bergthor nodded, though it was clear he did not know what to make of Starri.

  Thorgrim felt a wave of misery wash over him. Bergthor had saved Harald’s life. Certainly any man there would have done the same, but that did not change the fact that Bergthor had indeed saved the life of Thorgrim’s son. What did he owe a man who did such a thing?

  His thoughts moved on to Harald, sulking somewhere down the beach. What had he just said to the boy? You made the whole fleet weaker by leaving. You divided us, and we would have been in a bad place if it had come to a fight.

  And now he, Thorgrim, was planning on doing the exact same thing.

  “I won’t decide for everyone,” Thorgrim said at last. “We’ll meet on it. Me and the masters of my ships. Together we’ll decide whether or not to join you in your raiding.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  In the same year [Æthelwulf] went to Rome with much honor

  and taking with him his son, the aforesaid King Alfred,

  a second time on the same journey…

  Asser’s Life of King Alfred

  Felix listened to the messenger’s report, the Northmen landing on the beach at Portsmouth with a dead wha
le. He took a moment or two to ponder the situation. It was a complication he did not want or need just then.

  Like a street performer on a tight rope, Felix was trying to maintain his careful balance between Æthelwulf and his real master, King Charles the Bald. This had all been set up so carefully: the pilgrimage, the royal visit to West Frankia, the audience with the pope. And now the damned heathens had come blundering right into the middle of it.

  For that reason, Felix’s first impulse was to just let the heathens be, ignore them while they rampaged around the country, knowing that God in his own time would take them all to Hell. He considered keeping word of their arrival to himself. But of course Alfred had heard it too, and if Felix was going to tell Alfred to keep quiet he would have to give him a very good reason why he should.

  “The heathens…” Alfred said. “The messenger says they’re at Portesmutha. If we leave from Hamtun as we’ve planned we’ll have to sail right past them.”

  “You’re right,” Felix said, impressed, if not surprised, by Alfred’s grasp of the geography of the area. He had thought of that himself — they could not leave from Hamtun now without sailing right into the heathens’ murderous arms.

  “In truth I think we’ll meet them before that,” Felix continued. “Northmen come for plunder, and there’s nothing worth stealing at Portesmutha. Some fishermen’s huts, that’s it. No, they’ll come to Hamtun if they know what they’re about. Plunder Netley Abbey and the church there.”

  And that settled it. There would be no hiding the presence of the Northmen.

  When at last Æthelwulf was finished with his private mass, Felix informed him of this new threat that had come to the shores of Wessex. And Æthelwulf reacted exactly as Felix knew he would.

  “Heathens? Damned heathens? Vermin! We must stamp them out like vermin!” Æthelwulf all but shouted. He was not a young man, but he was not feeling the ravages of age as some did. He could be forgetful, and sometimes not entirely clear on the circumstances, but the prospect of the pilgrimage, the royal visit with Charles the Bald, the papal audience, all seemed to have had a wonderful effect on him, mind and body. His energy was that of a man twenty years younger, which was a welcome thing. Or mostly a welcome thing, though not always.

  “Felix, see the men-at-arms are turned out, and let word be sent to raise the fyrd. No delay, we must crush these whore’s sons before they do too much damage.”

  “Sire, we should tell the nobles and the ealdormen. Of course you are eager to be at the heathens, but it would be best if the other men of import were at least made aware of your plans.” Æthelwulf, in his enthusiasm, was ready to plunge into battle alone, without even knowing how many of the heathens there were, or where exactly they had come ashore.

  Word had already spread throughout the court by the time the nobles and ealdormen were summoned to the great hall, a magnificent building of stone walls and a high, vaulted ceiling supported by intricately carved beams. Benches and tables filled much of the space, and at the far end, the dais on which Æthelwulf’s massive marble throne was perched. Those in attendance filled the benches, each jostling as forcefully as he dared to be as close to the dais as he could, though they mostly sorted themselves out by wealth and stature. Sunlight streamed in through the high, narrow windows and fell at regular intervals in great squares across the hall, illuminating the rich cloth and silver jewelry of the eager seated men.

  So much arrogance, Felix thought, looking out over the important men of Wessex from where he stood at Æthelwulf’s right hand. How does it all fit into this building?

  But, he had to admit, if the Northmen were going to land in Wessex, they had picked an advantageous time and place, at least as far as Wessex was concerned. All of these men crowding the hall had come to see Æthelwulf off on his pilgrimage, or to accompany him, and they had brought their house guards with them, their elite warriors, so that they could each make a great show of their power and wealth. As a result there was quite a number of skilled and experienced men-at-arms at Winchester just then, and even better, they were not in Æthelwulf’s pay.

  “You’ve all heard by now,” Æthelwulf said from the dais, then paused and waited as the men in the hall reluctantly stopped talking. “Heathens have landed in Portesmutha, and they’ll be intent on sacking Hamtun I’ll warrant. The abbey there and the church and whatever else they can get their damned hands on. Felix, how many are there?”

  “It was not clear, sire,” he said. “But there were eleven or twelve ships. Five hundred men, perhaps?”

  Æthelwulf waved his hand dismissively. “I fought those bastards three years ago, and there was three times that number!” he said. It was a battle that every man in that room had heard of, in some detail, and in which many had fought. The kingdoms of Wessex or Kent or Mercia were not always successful in keeping the heathen host at bay, let alone defeating them. But Æthelwulf had done so, and quite decisively, an impressive victory against a large heathen army.

  “A lot of you here, you fought with me then. Egbert, you were there. And Leofric. Do you recall?”

  “Yes, sire,” Egbert called, pleased to have been singled out.

  “I recall, sire,” Leofric called. “Many of us were there. Alhmund was there, as were Byrnhorn and Ingwald. And Lord Nothwulf, ealdorman at Dorsetshire.”

  “Of course, of course,” Æthelwulf said, nodding and smiling at the memory. “Wait,” he said, “Nothwulf? Nothwulf, were you there?”

  “No, sire,” Nothwulf called, trying not to sound as pathetic as Felix knew he must feel.

  “Right,” Æthelwulf said. “It was your brother, Merewald, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes, sire,” Nothwulf called and Felix, despite have no particular love of Nothwulf, almost winced with sympathy. That was no mistake on Leofric’s part, he was sure, and he wondered what had happened between the two men that Leofric should want to humiliate his ealdorman so. But Leofric was a wealthy man, and a powerful man who had fought beside the king, and that gave him considerable influence in court.

  “Sire, we had best get back to our discussion of the Northmen in Portesmutha,” Felix prompted.

  “Of course,” Æthelwulf said. “Leofric, you just fought a fleet of these bastards, down at Christchurch, did you not?”

  “Yes, sire,” Leofric said. Felix knew for a fact that Nothwulf had also been part of that fight, and he wondered if Leofric would be so egregious as to leave him out, but he added, “And Nothwulf was there as well.”

  “Do you think these are the same heathens?”

  “I don’t know, sire. There were seven ships that we fought. We burned one of them. There’s eleven or twelve ships now. Perhaps they’ve joined up with some others.”

  “Perhaps,” Æthelwulf said. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I’ve sent orders for the fyrd to be raised, and I would think any man within five miles at least should be here in time to join us. Twenty if he has a horse. When will you and your men be ready to march?”

  “An hour, sire!” a man called from the back of the hall and the rest called out their concurrence. Just as they had fought to be nearest to the dais, they would fight to be first in readying themselves for battle.

  Because this was an opportunity not to be wasted. The heathens, whom Æthelwulf hated more than sin itself, had landed and were now stopping him from proceeding on a holy pilgrimage. Here was an opportunity for each man to ride into battle at his king’s side, where the chances for glory were great, as was the chance that one of his neighbors would be killed, thus making his lands available to be given by the king as a gift of appreciation.

  “An hour, then,” Æthelwulf said. “Then we’ll form our men in the courtyard and march off to battle! Felix, see that the arrangements are made!”

  Felix, see that the arrangements are made, Felix thought. Six or seven hundred men marching off to battle, a battle they could not reach in one day, or maybe even two. They would need food and drink, tents, spare horses, wagons…. Even with all the servant
s swarming over the royal court it would be nearly impossible to get that arranged in an hour’s time.

  Or would have been, had God not given his servant Felix a blessing for once and arranged to have a train of wagons already waiting and loaded with everything they would need for the march. Rough, simple food and drink for the fyrd were even now stacked on the carts, along with something better for the men-at-arms, and the finest for the king and his court. Tents for the warriors, pavilions for the nobility, equipped with furniture for campaigning in the field that was finer than anything that most anyone in Wessex would ever own.

  Yes, he was ready.

  It took two hours, not one, for the men-at-arms and those who commanded them to assemble in the courtyard, but that was still less time than Felix had thought they would take, and they all still had to wait for Æthelwulf and his closest advisors, the bishop among them, to emerge.

  They made an impressive column as they rode out of Winchester, all the men in their best armor and helmets. Anyone of any importance was on horseback, the rest on foot. Poles with bright banners streaming from their peaks rose up above the line of men to signify whose warriors were whose.

  Æthelwulf, of course, was at the head of the column, his horse a lovely black stallion, its armor, like the king’s, polished to a brilliant shine. Both horse and king wore elaborate helmets. Æthelwulf’s was adorned with gold filigree and a bright burst of plume on the crest. A smile cracked his gray beard. Æthelwulf was clearly enjoying this. It was, Felix imagined, was as close to reclaiming his youth as the old man was likely to get.

  They rode south through what was left of the day, which was not much, until they came to some fields where the grass had been grazed short, and made camp there. They had been careful to not outmarch the train of wagons, which meant that they did not have to wait on their tents and food and drink to catch up, but it also meant that they did not cover much distance at all.