by Jason Born
“Crush them between us!” Godfrey screamed. His eyes appeared like white, burning beacons amidst his blood strewn face. “Push! Push again!”
I saw fear in the Englishmen’s faces. Though they still outnumbered us, those faces blanched. Strenwald saw it too. He kicked his feet from his stirrups and jumped down to fight with his men, his now terrified men. They looked back to their homes and thought of their wives and children burning. They looked at the beaten, trounced form of Goda. The English watched the crazed charger fleeing and wished to trade places. They looked at all the bodies littering the shingle and their minds told them that all those dead were their own countrymen. I know this is what they thought because of what happened next. When a battle shifts mightily against you, you begin to see everything as a loss. Or, when you believe the battle has shifted, even though it has not, you see only destruction. Those soldiers that day, at that time, thought they would lose. Their hearts fled. They melted like the last icicle hanging from the longhouse eave on a sunny day.
We pushed them. We crushed them.
We were victorious.
CHAPTE
R 7
Spurred by the confusion in the English lines and with renewed vigor, we stepped on the bodies of our fallen comrades and those of the defenders. We pushed and stabbed at them. Our men who emerged from the smoke did likewise. The enemy fought hard, but with little soul. When Godfrey’s sword chopped off, first, Earl Strenwald’s fingers then his hand and finally his arm, the weary soldiers fell to their knees. Their hands went up as their weapons went down. They pled with us that we cease. They babbled. They sought our compassion.
“Kill one in ten of the remaining,” offered Randulfr.
“Use the rest to fight the fire so we don’t have to wait for a week for the embers to cool. I’d hate to have to retrieve a heavy mountain of melted, unwieldy gold from this mint,” added Leif.
Killian wiped a small hand against his forehead which was wet with sweat and the splattered brains of an Englishman. “They make sense, King Godfrey.”
Godfrey looked up at the growing fire. The smoke swirled and climbed into the sky. The north wind pushed it south over more of England. The king nodded in agreement, for which I was pleased because every man added would mean one less bucket of sea water to haul. However, like a zigzagging hare changing directions while darting from a fox, Godfrey changed his mind. “No, kill them all. Make it fast. I don’t want to have to look over my shoulder while we take Aethelred’s coins. Any one of these men would happily stab me in my back.”
“The whirlwind,” mumbled Killian, “you’ll reap it.”
“But Godfrey you accepted the Welsh as fellow raiders,” I said. “What is wrong with sparing these men if they work for us just today?” At the time I didn’t know of which whirlwind Killian spoke. I wasn’t fond of the idea of leaving enemies alive. I say again that I didn’t want to lug any more water than I had to.
“You’ll kill them, Greenlander,” said Godfrey. “And you’ll remember to call me king.” Godfrey was feeling strong again. That was a good thing. His temporary despondency while on Anglesey was becoming a distant memory now that he had two rapid triumphs in his recent history. Godfrey was also feeling arrogant. That, too, was a good thing, for of all the kinds of people who ought to be arrogant, shouldn’t one be a king?
I cursed and unsheathed my sword. With two hands I brought the edge down on the shoulder of a surrendered Englishman. I swore. I felt like a murderer. The blade was tired and so were my muscles. It dug one-third of the way through and halted. When the whining soldier toppled over and writhed in pain, he jerked the hilt from my hand. The sword’s guard scratched a path in the stones while he convulsed.
The rest of our band stabbed and killed the unarmed soldiers. For their part, the English didn’t go without a fight. They scraped at us. They snarled like cornered rats. It was a dirty, grisly business. Even zealous Aoife and Killian lingered back and watched their feet rather than us as we tore into them. The Welsh, however, were more fervent than any of the others. It wasn’t that different from how I, from Rogaland in Norway, would have treated a Dane in similar circumstances. If that Dane had wronged me or my family – as far back as two generations ago – I would have ardently chopped him to pieces. I think the Welsh felt that way about the English – and to be fair, vice versa.
“Now what?” asked Leif as the final Englishman exhaled his last. “Buckets from the boats? Scrounge what containers we can from other boats and buildings? Form a fire brigade?” He finished by saying, “We could have used those men.” Leif was just as disgusted with his king as the rest of us.
“Aethelred’s coins aren’t in the town. Let the stinking mess, burn.” Godfrey pointed with his nose to my right, the west. “We go there.”
Properly confused, his army peered along the shore to the west. There, perhaps one hundred fadmr in distance, where earlier thick fog clung, stood a tall bluff that dropped straight into the sea. Sitting atop that bluff, precariously close to the eroding cliff’s edge, was an earthen and stone fort. The outermost wall was strong, mortared stone that abutted the cliff’s edge. I could see the top of a tall, narrow keep, like the newer one in Aberffraw, tucked inside the fort. From down there on the shingle the stronghold at Watchet looked huge, towering, and formidable.
I didn’t think we could take it.
“Eat and drink,” called Randulfr, anticipating his king’s next order. “Only one pot of ale! We don’t need thick-tongued, wobbly kneed drunkards around when we assault that dung castle.”
“And piss and shit, men,” added Godfrey. “We reassemble here shortly. We’re not done sticking the English pigs yet.”
. . .
I wanted a fitting meal, eggs in a pan for instance. I craved meat. My body cried for energy. We had no time for a cooking fire. I reached into the cage of two of the hens we carried on Charging Boar and stole their eggs. The hens themselves came from Maredubb’s personal coop. I cracked each of the shells on my lower teeth and poured their contents into my mouth. The flavor wasn’t correct for what I craved, but after just a moment of near nausea, my belly thanked me. I gulped a pot of ale before dropping my trousers and pissing over the gunwale into the lapping sea. My frothy waste mixed with the churning waves and the oozing blood that seeped and leached its way down from the battle site.
Aoife stuck her miniature rear over the same edge and relieved herself. She gnawed on a piece of salted fish and used it to wave in my direction as she spoke. “That Turf Ear was a tough critter! I think he still swore at them when he was lying in the stones.”
“He was,” I agreed. I looked over to where his mangled body lay heaped with the rest. It was difficult to tell whose arm or leg went with whose body. He was one of twenty-six of our number who lay dead. Another batch of wounded rolled about moaning. There was nothing that we could do for them at the moment if we wanted to survive. We had to get our quarry before the smoke from the town’s fire called in more English soldiers down one of their herepaths, originally built by Alfred. Killian nursed our wounded as best he could. He helped them to the boats and gave them a cup of ale.
“If I die on a strandhogg, I’ll go that same way,” Aoife blustered. “I’ll fight to the end.”
I cinched the cord that held up my trousers and replaced my leather belt with its scabbards dangling. I had left fingerprints made red with the blood of the English behind. “I’m sure you will.” The girl made me smile. I had certainly not wished for her to come, but if I am truthful with myself, and even you, I liked the little creature. Perhaps, I decided, I’d share some of my portion of the treasure with her. She could use it to buy her freedom. Thoughts like that were for another time.
“Move!” called Godfrey. “All this smoke will eventually bring more soldiers.”
Aoife hadn’t finished her business. “Stay with the ships,” I said.
The fiery beast began issuing a string of curses at me. When she took a moment to breathe, I answere
d, “Listen, you runt, I don’t tell you to remain here because I’m fond of you or because I want to protect you or because I think you’ll be in the way. No, I tell you to stay here because I don’t want an enterprising villager to skulk over here with some of those burning embers and torch our escape route.” I slapped my father’s saex into her hand that held the fish. “Kill them with that if they try.”
She jumped off the gunwale and wiggled so that her rag dress slipped back down to her dirty thighs. “What says I won’t use this against you?” she asked.
“You won’t. You’re a warrior and warriors follow orders.”
Her lips pursed as Aoife gave my answer some thought. She shrugged in agreement and ran across the ship, bound onto the dock, and found a place from which to stand guard. She stabbed at a dead Englishman to practice her craft.
“Halldorr!” barked Godfrey, looking perturbed.
I scurried back to the shore with my clattering gear. The king was right to be anxious. We had a mint to take.
. . .
The town burned. The northerly wind that had blown in behind us allowed the smoke to climb very little before it shoved the black mountain southward to where the residents had fled. Occasionally, I caught a glimpse of flocks of the terrified villagers staring at what had been their homes from a safe distance away among healthy green fields. At least they would be able to harvest and eat, I thought.
Godfrey led us along the shingle toward the tall bluff. With the town receding on our left, we came to the mouth of small creek. Its contents quietly dumped out into the shingle, lazily mingling with the damp stones and lapping surf. It appeared as if the brook angled to the south and west. A road, the herepath, crossed the creek and wound its way up to the mint. The king stopped there to study our goal.
“Maybe the creek curves around the fort?” I offered. “We could follow it and cover at least some of our approach.”
Randulfr examined the mouth of the brook, then the tall cliffs and their tumbling rocks. “It’s worth a try, King Godfrey,” he said. “At least it’s not one of Leif’s crazy ideas.” The king’s lieutenant pointed up the hill. “We’ll not be getting up there very easily.” Several helmeted heads poked up over the mortared, stone wall. They studied us as we studied them.
Godfrey veered left and splashed into the creek. His rattling band followed him down the deep path the old waterway had cut through the soils and rocks of the landscape. We quickly lost sight of the fort as a few spindly willows and thorn bushes closed in at the tops of the banks.
“This was a wise idea, Halldorr,” said Godfrey as we splashed along. “They know we’re coming, but at least – if the creek goes in the right direction – they won’t know where we are.” He shrugged. “That’s something.”
“You’ve got fortune on your side, King Godfrey.” The creek’s water was cool. My submerged feet were getting cold.
“I’ve got nothing yet,” Godfrey corrected. “We’ve killed some Englishmen, which is fine work if you can get it, I suppose. But I don’t do it lightly. We need to have something to show for all the blood we lost on the beach.”
“Twenty-six dead on the rocks,” answered Killian. He splashed along behind me. He had tied the skirts of his priestly vestments into a large knot around his waist so that only his boots and trousers were soaked. “Another sixteen wounded and stowed on the ships.” The Irishman sighed. “Half of those will be dead by tomorrow. May the Almighty console them and save their souls.” Killian crossed himself. I found comfort from his words and even the action of the cross. Strange, I thought.
Godfrey grunted. “So once again, we are only about fifty men and we think we will assault a castle.” He didn’t say it in a frustrated or defeated voice. It was almost said with confident madness. We all must have been mad, however, because when he spoke the words, they seemed as natural to me as a fish living in water. “You were also wise to leave that little thrall of yours with the boats. As dirty and filthy as she is now, maybe she’ll grow into a beautiful woman one day. If you take her as your wife, I know one thing. You’ll never be in want of adventure.”
Tyrkr, some three men behind, laughed. “A thrall takes revenge at once. A fool never takes revenge.” The rest of us laughed, not with him, but rather at him. The old adage was true, of course, as we all knew. But just as obvious to us all was that it didn’t fit the conversation. Tyrkr knew only that we spoke of thralls. The maxim was one of our native Norse sayings he had picked up as his favorite. It made him, as a thrall, feel a rank above a fool, though he sometimes played both roles. But didn’t we all play the fool?
“In truth, king, I left her there to protect our way out and the wounded.”
“She’s spirited, but what can she do if those villagers get curious and want a bit of revenge?” asked Godfrey.
“A thrall takes revenge at once,” Tyrkr began.
“We heard that,” barked Leif.
“The girl’s surprised me. I imagine she surprised you over the past year since you took her. She did well today. I believe she’ll surprise us again. As much as it drives me to madness, Leif knows how things will work out. He bought the girl for me, so I should trust him.” I looked over to my young friend. He grinned behind his red, sprouting whiskers. Leif raised his eyebrows and wrinkled his forehead as if he knew more secrets that he wouldn’t share. He stayed silent.
“Perhaps we should have left some able men behind to protect the ships,” said Randulfr. “We’ve always left a guard before.”
“You’re right,” said Godfrey. He hopped to the bank. His feet sank in the soft mud as he crawled up where there was an opening in the foliage. Godfrey peeked over the edge while we waited. “But we’ll need every single man we have to take the mint.”
Curious to see the fort from this vantage point, we all mimicked the king, crawling up the slippery bank to peep through the thorns and bushes. A slithering copse of trees had followed the path of the creek. It ended two or three fadmr away from the bank. Beginning at the trees’ end was a long, sloping rise – wide open – that ran all the way up to the fortress’s stone walls. A gate stood on this side facing the English countryside. The thick wooden doors were tightly bolted. A gaping ditch was traversed by a narrow bridge that the garrison had already torched. It lay in smoldering ruins. A wide, dirt road ran in either direction. The eastern path ran down toward the town we had burned. It was the one that wound up the hill from the beach. The western path continued on along the seaside cliffs and disappeared in the distance. The road was most definitely the herepath that more Englishmen would use to come to the aid of their countrymen at Watchet.
If we wanted Aethelred’s coins, we had to act fast before they came.
Fast. But there would be no surprise.
. . .
“Hel’s frozen crotch!” exclaimed Godfrey. He spun and sank on his rump into the muck. The king bit his lip and bit at the inside of his cheek. His icy confidence from just moments earlier was thawing.
“Burn the doors?” I asked. Don’t judge me too harshly for my idiotic suggestion. Recall that this entire endeavor was my first strandhogg, my initiation into raiding. I knew nothing of the subject other than I was young, virile, and strong. If a man came at me with a weapon and if he didn’t kill me in the first few moments, he’d soon find his entrails sloshing through his fingers. I understood that if I survived, I’d earn an allotment of the takings.
“Do you think they’ll just let us march up there and kindle a fire next to the doors?” Brandr huffed.
“And if they did,” Loki began, “a few arrows from the ramparts and a bucket of water would end the assault before it started. You’re talking about part of a siege. Sieges can last days, weeks, or months. We don’t have that kind of time. We don’t have the manpower or the tools to build siege engines.”
Killian laughed sardonically at Loki. “It’s not a matter of tools or the number of men, fool. None of us knows the first thing of building engines.” The priest gave Lo
ki a frown then crouched and walked along the slowly moving creek to face the king. He knelt, half in the water, half in the mud. “Any guess as to how many men in the fortress?”
Godfrey glowered. “No. What did the parchment that you found at Maredubb’s keep say?” The king didn’t wait for any answer. “Oh, that’s right. You said that the mint was to be unguarded. That was the word you used, correct? Unguarded?”
Killian shrugged, but took the jab in stride. “That is what the parchment said. Clearly that’s not the case. It said only that reinforcements for an unguarded garrison were going to arrive shortly. Perhaps those reinforcements are who we fought at the shingle? Perhaps the fort is now nearly vacant.”
“We won’t know until we run across that open field like a deer, fly across the trench like a raven, and successfully scale the wall like a marten,” said Godfrey. He closed his eyes as he thought of a way through the problem.
Leif crawled back to his feet and peeped over the bank again. “Halldorr, how tall is that wall?”
Without opening his eyes, Godfrey shoved me toward Leif. “See what the red-haired diviner has to say. Maybe he can find a way to have the soldiers invite us in like he did in Aberffraw.” I, wary, joined my friend.
“From here it looks like two, or maybe just two and then a bit more, fadmr.” I reached an arm over the rim of the bank and pointed through the thicket. “See that sentry’s head? Would it take about fifteen of his skulls stacked to run from the bottom to the top? Why do you ask?”
Leif had already turned around. He slid down the mud into the creek and splashed through to the other side. Leif scrambled up into the thin line of forest that snaked along that bank. He planted his feet on the floor of the woods, set his hands on his hips, and looked skyward. He was nodding.
“Oh, what is it?” asked Killian. “You like to act as if you’ve found the master plan long before the rest of us.”
“I have,” said Leif. His head now scanned up and down several long, narrow trees. Situated away from the forest edge and not growing in the center of a field, they were nearly branchless, except for the very tops. Leif counted, nearly under his breath. “One, two . . .”
