Conqueror tt-2

by Stephen Baxter

  They came to the town of Snotingaham, at the heart of Mercia. The great Offa's kingdom was now ruled by a Danish puppet-king, much of it colonised by Northmen and their families. Snotingaham itself was under the thumb of the Danes, but the English went about their lives mostly unperturbed.

  Here, Amgrim sought out a friend of his called Leofgar.

  Leofgar was a burly, jovial, prosperous-looking man with a livid scar painted across his face. His hair was a woolly mass as black as night; Cynewulf wondered if he dyed it.

  Leofgar clapped an arm around Arngrim. 'We're old buddies,' he said to Cynewulf. 'We fought together against the Danes a decade ago, when they took Snotingaham and holed up in it, and the West Saxons came to help us out.' He touched the scar on his face. 'We couldn't get rid of the Danes back then, but I took away a trophy, as you can see – that and the life of the Danish brute who gave it to me.'

  Since his fighting days Leofgar had become a weapons dealer. And from the look of his fine cloak and jewellery, a decade of war with the Force hadn't done business any harm. Cynewulf wondered cynically if he had any qualms about selling weapons to both sides.

  Arngrim said this formidable man was to be their guide for the rest of the journey through Northumbria to Eoforwic. They needed him, for as everybody knew the Northumbrians were a rough lot, and had been even before the Danes came and killed their kings.

  They were treated to a heavy night of eating and drinking at Leofgar's home. Then they woke before dawn as usual. With banging heads and growling stomachs, led by Leofgar, they resumed their long journey, progressing into the bleak, hilly country of Northumbria.

  The Northumbrians' uncouth accent was all but incomprehensible to Cynewulf. They were a sour bunch who resented their British neighbours to the north, and the English kingdoms to the south, and their new Danish overlords in Eoforwic. They didn't even much like each other, and given half a chance they would be at each other's throats pursuing ancient grievances once again. And they drank prodigiously. In their cups they would sing long mournful songs about the great days of Kings Edwin or Oswald or Oswiu, before they fell to puking, fighting, humping, or all three.

  'And that's just the monks,' as Arngrim said dryly.

  But even among these dour folk change was apparent. Quite unconsciously, they laced their speech with Danish words.

  There was another difference. Markets studded the countryside: small places, not towns, springing up at crossroads or river crossings, anywhere convenient. They were just huddles of stalls and booths where you could buy salted meat and winter vegetables, and bits of clothing, shoes, knives. There were even, strangely, bits of jewellery to buy. Cynewulf had only ever seen kings, thegns and bishops and their ladies sporting jewellery; here even humble peasants wore glittering clasps and shoulder-brooches.

  All this was more change brought by the Danes. Before the invasions England had been fragmented into vast estates, with a river or two for transport and for fishing, some good lowland for ploughing, hill country or moorland for the sheep, and so on. The estates were like miniature countries, contained in themselves. And you expected to spend your whole life on your estate, tied by bonds of loyalty and tax duty, and you would barter and spend at the estate's own markets.

  Now the Danes were sweeping all this away. The Danish warriors, parcelling up the countryside, were farmers themselves. But their holdings were smaller, and whatever they couldn't supply themselves they traded for: fleeces for timber, perhaps, or horses for hops. Suddenly trade was exploding across England in a network of tiny markets, and vast quantities of money washed across the countryside.

  And the English in the new Danish territories, having exchanged one lot of lords for another, were paradoxically discovering a new form of freedom. You didn't have to live off the estate where you happened to work; you could choose what to buy, to wear or to eat. And if you had a surplus, even a small one, you might buy yourself a little luxury: pepper or some other spice, perhaps, or even a bit of jewellery. Suddenly you had choice. And vendors were taking the opportunity to chum out cheap brooches, pots and plates to sell to these new customers.

  All these markets were at places that had no need of names before, and a rain of new place names was falling across Dane-controlled England from Lunden to Eoforwic and beyond – and most of those names were Danish.

  Arngrim didn't like this. 'Even if Alfred wins,' he growled, 'even if he or his sons push the Danes all the way back into the sea where they came from, it will be hard to scrub all this out of men's minds.'

  VIII

  At last they reached Eoforwic, which the Romans had called Eburacum, and its new Danish kings called Jorvik. Whatever its name, the stony Roman core of the city still stood square on its high ground over the river. Wharves snaked down to the water, and carts and foot-travellers slogged up rough tracks to the city walls.

  To reach the city the travellers had to cross a bridge, Roman-built, decayed, eroded, scarred by fire, but still solid, and busy with travellers. From the bridge Cynewulf peered down at a crowded waterway. Danish ships made their way with oars plashing, sails furled, and masts lowered so they could make it under the bridge. But there were lesser vessels too: log-ships each carved out of a single tree-trunk, and boats that were little more than leather-covered frames, like the currachs that had once carried the Irish monks into the ocean. These smaller craft, piled high with fish, eels and dried bundles of reeds, were manned by English folk whose ancestors had made their living from the river for generations before the Danes.

  Once they were over the bridge they followed a good road that ran up from the river bank, through a jumble of slumped wooden buildings, straight to a gatehouse in the solid Roman walls. After centuries of weather and war the walls were much repaired, but they still stood twice as tall as a man. In one corner a tower had been erected, much cruder than the original Roman structures, perhaps planted there by a long-dead Northumbrian king. Leofgar said that for a while the Danes had installed a puppet English king here, but now Danish kings had taken over, and the latest ruler was planning a proper palace, a timber marvel to be built in the south-east corner of the walls.

  At the gatehouse they were stopped by tough-looking Danish warriors who demanded a toll. Once Arngrim had paid up Leofgar led them all confidently into the town.

  Inside the walls the place felt even more cramped than Cynewulf had expected, full of low wooden buildings crammed in around the feet of the vaster Roman ruins. He was overwhelmed by the crowds, the yells of vendors, and above all by the stink, of human sewage and rotting thatch and animal droppings. It was like walking into a vast compost heap. But this crowded place was full of life, and Cynewulf, unused to cities, felt excitement stir in his soul.

  The people dressed brightly, in tunics and leggings dyed yellow, red, black and blue. They wore cloaks against the winter cold, but the men kept them thrown back so one side of their bodies was always exposed, and they all carried at least one weapon, a sword, axe or knife. They were tall, well-muscled, intimidating – and you couldn't tell at a glance who was Danish and who English.

  If the people were impressive, their homes were less so. Built on rough timber frames, they were roofed by ragged straw or turf, and their walls were of woven hazel or willow packed with mud or dung. The Danish occupation of Jorvik was only a dozen years old, so none of these huts was older than that – and yet, pounded by northern rains, their misshapen hulls were already slumping into the filthy earth.

  The amount of trade going on was astounding. The houses were built long and thin, crowding each other for frontage on the main streets. In the workshops behind these frontages tanners scraped and cobblers hammered, potters turned their wheels, and weavers treadled their looms with threads of wool weighted by pierced discs of fired clay. Leofgar the weapons dealer was on friendly terms with many of the smiths. In the houses open fronts wares of all sorts were displayed, from pottery and wooden tableware and jewellery to broiled rats sold to children for a clip from
a silver coin. Outside the carpenters' shops cups and plates were heaped up, wheel-turned from blocks of ash, dozens of them all but identical to each other, remarkable if you were used to hand-made goods. Cynewulf was very struck by one store that sold nothing but shoes, sewn from leather or moleskin, racked up on shelf after shelf like roosting birds.

  Ibn Zuhr fingered a pottery jug, deep crimson, symmetrical, well finished. He ignored the Danish jabber of the man who was trying to sell it to him. 'Look at this. I haven't seen anything of this quality since I was taken from Iberia. And I would guess that this is the first genuine city, as a Greek or a Moor would understand it, to be functioning in Britain since the Caesars. All in a decade!' Ibn Zuhr seemed fascinated, in his cold, supercilious way. 'The Danes, you know, have trading links from Ireland to the Baltic, from Greenland to Iberia. Under them, trade is booming, within the country as well as beyond.'

  'The Danish trade can boom all it likes,' growled Arngrim, 'until Alfred comes here and lops off its head like a weed. And then we'll get back to the old ways.'

  Ibn Zuhr the slave could only agree with his master.

  Leofgar led the party to the city's heart, where the shells of many Roman buildings still stood. It was quiet here, away from the bustle of the Danish markets. Cynewulf curiously walked inside the immense walls of what Leofgar called the principia, once the headquarters of a Roman legion, a mighty structure that could still be seen for miles around. Though now its roof had collapsed, leaving heaps of smashed tiles, the principia had stood, without maintenance, for four hundred years. Leofgar said that the Emperor Constantine had been elevated to the purple in this very building, accompanied by lightning strikes, flights of birds, crosses in the sky and other miracles. Cynewulf was a natural sceptic, and found it very hard to believe that the mightiest emperor of them all could have had anything much to do with Britain – and certainly not Northumbria, this dismal corner. But Leofgar seemed to enjoy the fantasy. Now the ground was being cleared of its paving stones, and bodies planted in the exposed earth. Thus a Roman principia was being turned into a pagan cemetery.

  Near the south-western corner of the principia, Cynewulf found a small stone-built chapel. This was actually a famous church, if you knew any Northumbrian history, built on the site of a wooden chapel set up here by King Edwin on the occasion of his conversion two centuries before. It was crudely built, and looked like a toy set beside the tremendous wall of the Roman ruin. But, neatly laid out on an east-to-west axis unlike the principia, it was unmistakably Christian. And where the principia was doomed to decay and demolition this small chapel was surely the seed of grander minsters to rise up in the future.

  The little church was just too tempting. Overwhelmed by his journey and all he had seen, Cynewulf begged leave of his companions and went inside to pray.

  IX

  Arngrim's party lodged with a cheerful, huge-armed English woman called Gytha. A widow, she made a living collecting scrap metal, which she sold on to the smiths, or direct to dealers like Leofgar. They were to stay here while Leofgar made his inquiries about Aebbe.

  Gytha's house was only one room, with doors in all four walls and benches around the walls, and a big hearth of reused Roman stone. The roof was just beams and planks laid over the mud walls, with thatch piled on top to keep in the warmth. When Cynewulf looked out the back he saw an open cesspit, not yards from where he would be sleeping. Gytha kept geese, and the floor of the house was slick with their dung. Pigs came wandering in too, dark, skinny, long-legged little beasts.

  A narrow staircase led down to a cellar where Gytha stored her 'scrap metal'. Cynewulf made out slit-open chain-mail, crushed helmets and broken swords, much of it splashed by brown blood. He tried not to judge Gytha over her corpse-robbing. After eighty years of the Northmen England was littered with bones, and he would be wrong to condemn a woman alone for trying to make a living. It was disturbing to think, though, that these bloody weapons and bits of broken armour would likely be forged into devices devoted to yet more killing.

  Cynewulf studied Ibn Zuhr as he poked around the house. 'I have heard you talk of the need for cleanliness. How does this make you feel?'

  'The customs of this country, and yours, are not my concern.'

  'Speak freely, man. I want to know.'

  Ibn Zuhr eyed him. 'You eliminate body waste without modesty. You do not wash after eating or after sex. You are all so filthy that sleeping next to a cess pit hardly makes a difference.' He smiled. 'Otherwise your country is a delight.'

  During that first night, as they all huddled in heaps of blankets around the dying fire, it become apparent that Leofgar's relationship with Gytha was more than just commerce. Arngrim laughed in the dark, and offered his friend encouragement. 'Keep it up, Leofgar, your pipe will be pumping any moment.'

  Leofgar's noisy ploughing made it impossible for Cynewulf to sleep. What made it worse yet was that the sounds and smells of their earthy passion worked their way into Cynewulf's head, and he grew an erection so hard it seemed to suck the very essence out of his soul. At last he reached under his blanket and, whispering prayers for forgiveness, relieved himself with a couple of brisk motions. It was an act that brought no pleasure, only shame, and in the morning he felt sure the others knew what he had done – especially Arngrim, who grinned at him as if they shared a joke.

  He felt the painful shame of those moments in the dark even more later that day, when Leofgar brought home Aebbe.

  She stood in Gytha's house – she refused to sit. She wore a grimy tunic that had been torn and crudely repaired. Her feet were bare, there were bruises on her arms and bare thighs, her hair was a mat of filth, and one cheek was puffed up and bloody.

  'She wasn't hard to track down,' said the blunt trader. 'Guthrum's boys are the only Danes still fighting, and his hoard of slaves and booty made quite a splash when it reached town.'

  Leofgar said that Aebbe had been sold in a batch of a dozen girls from Cippanhamm to a dealer who planned to ship them overseas. Fair English girls sold well in the east. Aebbe, though, was 'too damaged' to fetch much of a price. This phrase made Cynewulf shudder. It seemed the dealer had bought her without a close inspection; feeling cheated, he had taken out his rage on the girl. Then he sold her anyhow. She was strong, stocky, and a farmer took her at a knock-down price to work as a labourer. And it was from the farmer that Leofgar had been able to buy her back, though at a premium.

  Leofgar winced. 'Everybody made a profit on this girl except me, it seems.'

  Cynewulf approached the girl, full of shame. He had betrayed her; after all he had brought her to the King's hall where he had promised she would be safe. But he must speak to her. 'Aebbe. It is me, Cynewulf. Do you remember me?'

  'I have lost much, priest, but not my mind,' she said dully.

  'And you remember the Menologium-'

  'I haven't lost my memory either.' She looked up, defiant.

  Cynewulf thought he knew what she was thinking: that he wanted her only for what was in her mind, just as other men had wanted her only for the dark space between her thighs, not for her. 'And will you come back with me, to Wessex? For the prophecy may yet be of great value.'

  'Why should I? My great-grandmother was right. All men are fools and cowards or worse. Why should I help you?'

  'Because your King commands it,' Leofgar rumbled.

  'But my King,' she said, 'failed me.'

  Arngrim said, 'Leofgar told us you had been damaged.'

  'They used me,' Aebbe said. 'The Danes. And some of the other girls, and a few boys. But with me, he had a little fun. I think it was because he saw me with you, thegn, who he fought in the hall.'

  'Fun?' The word seemed monstrous even as Arngrim spoke it.

  She pulled up her tunic, exposing her belly and breasts. The wounds were livid, still barely healed. 'You can see the crucifix he drew with his knife,' she said. 'And these letters, copied from a scrap of a burned Bible. Here he heated the knife in the fire, so when he-'


  'Enough.' Gytha stepped forward, and with firm, motherly motions covered the girl up.

  'By Woden's balls,' Leofgar growled, 'a bit of humping is one thing. We've all done that, I think. But this-'

  'I will treat her,' Ibn Zuhr murmured. 'To ensure there is no infection.'

  Cynewulf, thinking of his own lustful weakness last night, was consumed by shame – as if he had done this to her himself.

  'Who did it?' Arngrim asked. 'Who was he, Aebbe?'

  'The leader,' she said. 'He was at Cippanhamm. They called him Egil.'

  Arngrim's eyes narrowed. 'Egil son of Egil. The Beast of Cippanhamm.'

  'There is something more,' Aebbe said.

  'What?'

  She turned to Cynewulf. 'You want me for the prophecy in my head. But Egil has it. An ancient copy of it, written down. I saw it.'

  Cynewulf was astonished. 'How is this possible?'

  Aebbe shrugged. 'I only overheard fragments. Boasting to his companions when he was drunk. A Norse ancestor of his called Bjarni went to Lindisfarena, on the very first raid, Egil said, though I didn't believe that. And Bjarni stole the prophecy, along with much gold from the monks.'

  Arngrim asked, 'And what does he do with it? I can't imagine a man like the Beast working out lists of dates.'

  'He cannot read it. But he is protected by its magic, he thinks. He believes he cannot die.'

  'Which helps explain why he behaves the way he does.'

  Cynewulf's mind raced. He muttered, 'In Boniface's commentary – there is said to be a line in the fifth stanza, something about the Danes taking the prophecy for themselves – I could not understand it…'

  Arngrim grinned, evidently enjoying Cynewulf's discomfiture. 'So, priest, whose prophecy is it, a pagan's or a Christian's?'

  Ibn Zuhr watched these exchanges, silent, fascinated.