War of the Wolf

by Bernard Cornwell

  The poet-priest was right; wæl feol on eorþan, the dead fell on the earth.

  All that happened in a moment. The dead men had been going to join Berg and were caught by the Norsemen who came streaming across the corner of the ditches. So my warriors died, but their deaths slowed the attackers for an instant, just long enough for the rest of my men to make the crude shield wall, but what really saved us was Svart charging in from the right at the head of Sigtryggr’s men.

  Then was the clashing of shields.

  Svart came like an úlfheðinn, maddened with battle-rage, a huge man, his beard hung with bones, and with a great war ax in both hands. At least a score of men were with him, their shields clashed against Sköll’s shields, it was Norseman fighting Norseman in a fury of blades. “Forward!” I shouted and my shield wall went into the fight. There were men beside me, men behind me, men screaming, as much from fear as defiance. But we were a shield wall, as were Svart’s men, and Sköll’s men had attacked in a frenzy that left them scattered. Their battle-rage was singing in their heads, they were slaughtering, they could not be beaten, except by a shield wall, and we struck them hard. Spears lunged. Svart had killed two men before my shield wall hit the Norsemen, but we added two more dead, both pierced by spears, and I saw a black-bearded man bellowing at Sköll’s men to make a wall. More of my men were coming, more of Sigtryggr’s were joining Svart. Beornoth, beside me, rammed his spear at the black-bearded man, who fended it off with his shield. I saw a new scar of wood slash across the snarling wolf daubed on the man’s shield, he lunged with his own spear, aiming at Beornoth who, in turn, caught the blade on his shield and I stepped forward and rammed Serpent-Breath at the big beard and felt her point cut into his throat. He half fell backward, held up by the men behind, and Finan cut at the man next to him, slicing Soul-Stealer into his mail-clad shoulder. A hammering of shields to my left and I saw my son had extended our wall, was leading new men into the fight, and then we could go no further. The Norse had made their wall, our heavy shields crashed together, and we heaved against each other.

  Serpent-Breath was the wrong weapon for this fight. Her blade was too long for the deadly embrace of shield walls. I dropped her and drew Wasp-Sting, my short seax, and slid her between my shield and Finan’s. She struck wood, I pushed on my enemy’s shield. Above the iron rim my enemy had fair hair, a dirty pox-scarred face, gritted teeth, a slit up the side of one nostril, and a short beard. He was young enough to be my son, he was shouting his hatred at me. A spear came from behind me, over my shoulder, and sliced open his cheek. Blood started fast, his shield faltered, and I skewered Wasp-Sting again, this time feeling her strike and pierce mail. The hatred on the young man’s face turned to surprise, then fear. Something struck my helmet, and for a heartbeat I was dazed. I did not see the blow, nor knew whether it was a spear or a sword that gave it, but the blow forced me back and Wasp-Sting slid free. I pushed forward again, shield high, and kept pushing, kept stabbing. Svart, disdaining to use a shield, was roaring to my right, swinging his massive ax to drive Sköll’s men back. The young man opposite me was shouting again, every bellow bubbling blood from his sliced cheek. Our shields grated together and I spat a challenge as I felt Wasp-Sting bite again, and this time she sank deep into the flesh beneath the mail and I twisted her, tried to rip her upward, and felt an enemy’s sword pushing at my waist, then that pressure suddenly vanished. A horn had sounded from the ramparts and it must have been some kind of signal because the men opposing us went backward, then turned and ran back along the ditches toward one of the fort’s three remaining entrances. The fourth, which faced Sigtryggr’s men across the western ditches, had been blocked with thick timbers.

  The fog was almost gone, leaving slow tendrils that writhed above the bloody turf. Heavy spears were thrown from the ramparts and one hammered into my shield, weighing it down. I stepped away from the men hurling the spears and wrenched the blade free from the willow board. I picked up Serpent-Breath. Neither my men nor Svart’s had followed the retreating Norsemen. I saw that the young man with the wounded cheek had gone with them, but he was limping and staggering. I wiped Wasp-Sting on the hem of my cloak and looked at Finan. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry, lord?”

  “I was slow. You weren’t. I’m sorry.”

  “They were quick, lord, they were quick.”

  “Maybe Sköll’s right. I’m getting old.”

  The Norse in the fort were jeering us. “Welcome to Sköllholm,” they shouted.

  I looked at our dead. “Did Wulfmaer have children?” I asked and should have known the answer.

  “Two,” Finan said. “The oldest was that little red-headed bastard who pushed his sister into the cesspit.”

  “You’re bleeding.”

  He looked at his shield arm. One of his arm rings was almost severed, the mail sleeve beneath was ripped, and blood was seeping through a rent in the leather liner. “I think I killed the bugger who did that.” He flexed his fingers. “No real damage, lord.”

  It is strange how there is sometimes a sudden calm in a battle, not that it was quiet, because Sköll’s men were still shouting and banging sword-blades against their shields, but for a moment neither side was trying to kill the other. We had made a long shield wall that straddled Heahburh’s high spur, but were making no attempt to advance, while the enemy was content to wait behind their ramparts. I counted seven dead from my men and four from Svart’s troop. Seven Norsemen had joined them in death, and Berg was missing.

  Berg, whom I loved like a son. Berg, so eager to please and so fearsome in battle. Berg, whom I had saved from death and who had proved so loyal a companion. He had been at the left-hand end of our line when I last saw him, and I walked there to ask if anyone had seen him. “He went down the hill, lord,” Redbad told me.

  “He escaped?”

  Redbad, a Frisian, shrugged. “Lost sight of him, lord. Bastards were on us.”

  I walked a few more paces to gaze down into the next valley where another fast stream tumbled on its stony bed. The valley was empty. Berg and his precious eagle flag were both gone. I supposed Sköll’s men had taken the banner as a trophy, but had they taken Berg too?

  My son had the same fear. “You think he’s a prisoner?”

  “I hope not,” I said, then wished I had not expressed the hope. Better to be a prisoner, I supposed, than dead, but any prisoner of Sköll’s might expect a foul death. I had seen enemies carve a screaming man to a slow death as a taunt to his watching comrades, and Sköll was more than capable of the same cruelty.

  “Maybe he joined Sigtryggr’s men, lord?” Redbad suggested.

  “He wouldn’t do that. He’s one of us.”

  “I can look, lord?”

  “If you want.” Though I knew he would not find Berg. If, somehow, the young Norseman had survived the sudden assault from the fog he would have sought me out. I touched the hammer at my breast and prayed that he lived.

  Sigtryggr was shouting at his men, telling them to hoist their shields, to keep the wall straight, to carry their swords and spears to the enemy’s ramparts. A score of boys had carried the unwieldy ladders up the hill, and men in Sigtryggr’s second rank now hefted the ladders. “We can win!” Sigtryggr shouted. “We will win!” He paused to let his men answer the shout, but the response was poor. He called again, assuring them of victory, but the battle’s opening had gone Sköll’s way, and our men were uncertain. None wanted to go forward to where Sköll’s jeering men were confident behind their wall.

  Battles rarely begin with a sudden blood-letting. Insults come first. Men stand and watch the enemy, they listen to the taunts of the enemy and the shouts of their leaders and they summon the courage that is needed before a fight. But this battle had begun abruptly with Sköll’s assault from the fog, and it had left our troops cold, damp, and dispirited. Had the sorcerer cursed us? In truth none of us had truly wanted to attack the fort, but Sigtryggr desperately wanted this campaign over. He wanted Sköll, w
ho was claiming Northumbria’s throne, dead. Perhaps we should have withdrawn, gone south, waited for Sköll to follow, and then fought a battle in open land. Instead we were locked in a deadly embrace with a grim fort, and it was too late to withdraw. If we retreated we would be pursued by Sköll’s triumphant and vengeful men, by warriors on horses who would harry us down the hill like a pack of wolves savaging sheep.

  The poet-priest frowned when I told him that. “Why didn’t you have horses, lord? I thought the leaders were always mounted in battle.”

  “Not always.”

  “But you could have taken your horses?”

  “It would have been difficult,” I said, “the path up from the valley was steep, and there was no space on Heahburh’s spur for a mass of horsemen, but yes, we could. We thought about it, and Sigtryggr and I discussed it the night before, and we decided no horses.”

  Father Selwyn frowned. “But don’t you see better from horseback?”

  “We do,” I explained patiently, “but we knew it would be a hard fight, maybe a desperate fight, and if we had taken our horses then our men would think we were ready to flee if the worst happened. By staying on foot, like them, we ran the same risks, and they knew it. That’s why.”

  “So then you attacked the fort?”

  “Only after we’d shared the last of the ale. We’d brought it all to the hilltop. But then? Yes, we attacked.”

  Sigtryggr and Svart led that attack. They took their shield wall forward and the spears began coming as soon as they reached the outer ditch. Very few arrows, I noticed, it was mostly heavy spears that were being hurled from the ramparts. I could hear the blades thumping into shields. Sigtryggr’s rearmost ranks were throwing spears back, not really in hope of killing any of the defenders, but trying to force them to shelter behind their shields.

  Cuthwulf, a hunter from Bebbanburg who led my archers, came to join me. “Should we be using the bows, lord?” He was a sinewy, sun-darkened man, whose limp did not prevent him from being the most deadly of my hunters.

  “How many arrows do you have?”

  Cuthwulf spat. “Not enough, lord. Fifty apiece?”

  I winced. “Save them.” I jerked my head northward. “You see that far corner?” It looked a long way off. “Use the arrows when we attack there. Not until then.” I glanced up and saw a watery sun showing through the lifting fog. “That’ll give your bowstrings time to dry out.”

  “I kept them under my hat,” Cuthwulf said, “so they’re dry enough, but God save you, lord.”

  My shield wall overlapped the fort so that we could look north down its long side toward the Tine valley. The lower part of the wall was made of stone, but over the years men had removed the upper courses to build barn or hall foundations, and the upper part was made of coarse thick timbers. There were plenty of defenders on that long wall, too many, but I had promised Sigtryggr to do my best to draw men from the rampart he was assaulting and it was time to keep that promise. Sigtryggr’s men were crossing the ditches, assailed by spears, trying to protect themselves with shields made even more unwieldy by the spears lodged in the willow boards. I could hear Svart shouting them forward. It was a struggle. The ditches were deep and the banks between the ditches were steep and slippery. Two of Sköll’s men were in the short tower at the fort’s corner and were hurling spears that were being handed up to them from inside the fort. “Cuthwulf,” I called him back. “You can kill those two bastards.”

  Cuthwulf selected an arrow, notched it on the string, took a deep breath, drew his short bow, held his breath, and loosed. The closest man on the tower was about to hurl a spear and the arrow struck him on the helmet. He jerked back, turned, and the second arrow pierced his nose. He sank down, clutching the wound. The other man ducked behind the parapet, and Cuthwulf grunted. “I meant to kill them both.”

  “You did well,” I said, then saw that Sigtryggr’s wall had crossed five of the seven ditches. Time to go, I thought. I had never felt so little enthusiasm for a battle, even the thought of revenging Stiorra’s death left me cold. It was the curse, I thought, and I remembered Snorri’s prophecy of the two kings dying, and I drew Serpent-Breath, tried to forget the curse, and shouted at my men to follow.

  And on that hill of death we went to the ramparts.

  Now they go forth, birds screeching,

  The gray wolf howls, the shield-wood clashes,

  Shield answers shaft. Wake now, my warriors,

  Grasp shields, be strong in valor,

  Fight your way forward!

  “I never told them to be strong in valor,” I said. “There’s no point in saying something like that. You can’t make a man brave by shouting at him.”

  “It’s a—” the young priest began.

  “—a poem,” I said, “I know.” I smiled. I liked Father Selwyn. “Bravery is overcoming fear,” I said, “and I don’t know how you do that. Duty helps a little, experience, of course, and not letting down your comrades helps a lot, but really bravery is a kind of madness.”

  “Madness, lord?”

  “It seems as if you’re watching yourself. You can’t believe what you’re doing. You know you might die, but you keep doing it. Battle madness. It’s what the úlfhéðnar have, but they use henbane or ale or mushrooms to fill them with the madness, but we all have some of it. If we didn’t we’d simply give in to the fear.”

  He frowned. “Are you saying,” he hesitated, not sure if he should speak what was on his mind, “are you saying you were frightened, lord?”

  “Of course I was frightened,” I admitted. “I was terrified! We were fighting the wrong battle in the wrong place. Sköll had planned it well. He let us come. He didn’t interfere with us as we approached. He wanted us to come to his walls and to be slaughtered in his ditches, and like fools we did just what he wanted. I knew we would lose.”

  “You knew—” he began to ask.

  “But we still had to fight,” I interrupted him. “We couldn’t retreat, not without being pursued and harried and killed, so we had to try to win. That’s fate. But yes, I knew we would lose. We’d made a mistake and we were doomed, but there’s only one way out of a mess like that. You have to fight your way through it.”

  We went forward, and, as I told Father Selwyn, I felt doomed. We were advancing down the side of the fort, which meant that once we had crossed the place where the ditches and banks turned around the tower, we were walking along the ridges, not across them, which made our advance quicker. We went in a rush and I remember being surprised that it suddenly seemed so easy. Spears came from our right, but they rattled or thumped on our shields, and then we turned, crossed two ditches, and closed on the wall. Then it stopped being easy. “Axes!” I shouted.

  I had given our biggest and strongest men the long-hafted axes with their broad blades and deep lower beards. Each shaft was as long as a spear, which made the weapons clumsy, but my men had learned how they were to be used. My front rank stood with me under the ramparts and the Norse hammered our raised shields with spears and axes. The wall was not much higher than a man, which meant the defenders were close and their blows heavy. I felt my shield splintering as the ax blades crashed into the boards. The Norse had seen us coming, had seen the gold around my neck, the arm rings glittering, and the silver on my helmet. They knew I was a lord and they wanted the reputation of killing me. I could not fight back. To lower the shield so that I could lunge up with Serpent-Breath’s long blade would expose me to the defenders, which meant our duty, the front rank’s duty, was to stand in the sloppy mud of the ditch and keep those defenders busy by making ourselves into easy targets.

  And behind us the big men with the strangely long axes struck. Those men, like Gerbruht and Folcbald, both Frisians, let the axes fall over the defenders and then hauled back, using the long spiked beard of the blade to gaff the enemy like fish. The heavy blows on my shield ended as the first ax blows landed, I heard a shout from above, then blood splashed on my splintered shield and some dripped th
rough a split in the wood. There was another bellow from above me, and a Norseman came tumbling over the rampart to fall at my feet. Vidarr Leifson, beside me, stabbed down with his short seax, the man jerked like a landed fish and then died. I remember the man dying, and then little more. My axes were working, at least until Sköll’s men learned to hack at the long shafts with their own axes, but every man we killed or wounded on the wall was immediately replaced by another, and it was one of those newcomers who hurled down a great block of stone that shattered my weakened shield and struck the left side of my helmet.