Sword of Vengeance, page 26
‘I sometimes wonder if the man who fishes the river or the churl who tills the earth cares if his lord is King Æthelred, Ealdorman Thered, or Olaf Tryggvason. He still must render up part of his catch, or part of his crop to his lord, so that great man can, in turn, feed his household and his warriors. What difference does it make to him who that lord is? What difference did the deaths of our brothers truly make?’
‘We stopped Ragnar from peeling the skin from innocent Saxons, and before he could capture women and children and send them to the slave markets into a life of living hell. We stopped Skarde from burning and raping his way across England, and Olaf Tryggvason from unleashing his warriors upon our people until his reputation shone like gold and his ships were too heavy with Saxon silver to sail north. Sweyn Forkbeard would surely have set his gaze on the throne at Winchester if we had not fought him on that terrible riverbank. We made a difference, and we still do.’
‘The Church and a divided kingdom ties our king in knots, so much so that we must fight the battles to keep his kingdom in order. You are a good man, Beo,’ said Thered, and he smiled wanly. The scars across his nose, mouth and cheeks twisted his face and Beornoth saw the pain in the ealdorman of Northumbria’s eyes. He suffered a living nightmare. The horrors of Maldon plagued his every moment. Beornoth understood that, and he felt some of that pain himself. He was just able to lock it away in a chest within his thought cage, though the dead and maimed rattled at the locks and tried to burst free to haunt him. Beornoth had no choice, and neither did Thered. They had to fight. They were oathsworn to do it, and Beornoth could not simply put down his vengeance like an old cloak. Much of what Thered said could be true, but Beornoth didn’t have time to ponder the warp and weft of such deep thinking. He was a thegn, and he fought against anyone who brought violence to the people he was sworn to protect. The right or wrong of it was not his concern. Beornoth was certain that he had made a difference, that people had lived because he had risked his life and sent other men to hell with his sword.
‘How can I help?’ said Lady Ælfflæd, climbing up to the fighting platform and brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear, the sleeves of her riding gown rolled up to the elbow.
‘You have brought men, lady,’ said Beornoth, ‘that is enough.’
‘Don’t brush me off, Lord Beornoth. I know the face of war as well as you. I will find whatever cloth I can, and buckets of water. Send any injured men to the hall and I will treat their wounds. I might not be able to wield a sword, but I’ll be damned to hell if I’ll allow the cowardly cur who turned his back on my lord husband on the field of battle to win this day. Send your men to me and I will send them back to you to fight some more. Fight hard today, Beornoth, be the man my husband knew you to be. You are the Viking killer, the hero of Watchet, Rivers Bend and survivor of Maldon. So, kill a traitor for me today so that my husband can rest in peace. He wants Godric’s soul; Byrhtnoth twists and turns in his grave and he yearns for retribution against the oathbreaker. Soak the ground with traitors’ blood and let us be avenged.’ Lady Ælfflæd placed a wiry hand on each of Beornoth’s shoulders and leaned into him. She fixed him with her pale blue eyes and there was a steel there that flowed through Beornoth’s bones. ‘Ealdorman Thered, we thank you for bringing your men south to Essex, and many of those brave warriors have already given their lives. The shire thanks you, and so do I. Be sure that you fight today on the side of God, that you wield your sword for justice and honour. You fight for the king, and for the people of England. This Godric is a foul beast, a man who swore an oath and turned his back when the need was greatest. When my daughter’s husband is ealdorman here, Essex will always be a friend to Northumbria, and we shall respond to your call if it is ever required.’
Thered stood straighter, and he bowed to the Lady Ælfflæd. At the same moment, Godric’s black horse pranced in the distance, and the sun flashed off his gold-hilted sword. Lifted by the Lady Ælfflæd’s words, Beornoth pulled his own blade free of its scabbard, turned to face the folk who busied themselves inside the old burh.
‘People of Branoc’s Tree,’ he called, and he levelled his sword and passed the blade slowly across the crowd of Saxon warriors, Vikings, fyrd men, nuns and orphaned children. ‘We are all the children of this land. We are Saxon and Viking, two peoples who have learned to live as one in this fine and beautiful land. We are women of Christ and children of parents lost to the sword. We make a stand here today in the name of all who have given their lives for this country and our way of life. A traitor comes to take this place with violence, a man who swore an oath to the noble Ealdorman Byrhtnoth, and when his time came to fight the Vikings, he turned and ran. He sees a shire weakened, its best and fiercest warriors slain by Sweyn Forkbeard and Olaf Tryggvason at the Battle of Maldon. There are men amongst you who followed Godric’s retreat from the battlefield. Men of the fyrd, East Saxon men who Byrhtnoth supported with food in hard winters. Men whom he provided with grain when your crops failed, or the blight took your barley. How many of you looked to Byrhtnoth when you fell on hard times and received succour? He died for you, and the Vikings cut off his head and pissed on his dead corpse. They mocked and dishonoured the great man, and Godric sowed the seeds of that humiliation when he turned and ran from a battle in which he was oathsworn to fight. Godric eyes an opportunity to make himself ealdorman. He picks on the bones of the dead to enrich himself, and we are all that stands between Godric and his cunning plan. I am Beornoth, thegn, and I will bleed every drop of my blood to defend you this day. So, fight now with honour and the valour of East Saxons. Byrhtnoth looks down upon us, and I feel his strength in my sword arm. He sees your deeds, so repay your lord’s kindness and bravery. Fight for him today and grant him vengeance with the blood of our enemies. There are Vikings amongst us who fight for reputation, warriors of the Danelaw. Odin looks upon you and respects your drengskapr. He sends you harminger, battle luck, and will glory in the cuts of your axes as so few stand against so many. Defenders of Branoc’s Tree, warriors of England, are you ready to fight? Who is with me?’
Fists punched the air, weapons shook, eyes burned wide with fury, and every person inside the hastily constructed defences roared their defiance. Beornoth held his sword aloft, and they cheered even louder.
‘For God and Ealdorman Byrhtnoth!’ he bellowed, and they sent up a cheer which Beornoth hoped would chill Godric to the bone. Beornoth closed his eyes, and he conjured the faces of Wulfhere, Leofsunu of Sturmer, Aelfwine of Foxfield, Offa, Wighelm and Wiglaf and all who had died because Godric turned his cloak when he was needed most.
Beornoth looked upon the new defences. On the freshly sharpened stakes they had sunk into the ground to make a new wall, the rocks and timber spears, and the holes they had dug to trap Godric’s warriors. He hoped it would be enough, and he cast his eyes to heaven and whispered a prayer to Christ, and to his dead friends, he asked for them to grant him the strength he needed to fight, to endure the axes, swords, spears and cudgels men brought to hack and cut at him. Beornoth closed his eyes and sucked in a deep breath of East Saxon air, and he prayed that his battered, scarred body would hold up for one more fight, one last clash of arms to wreak vengeance for the men he had loved like brothers.
‘A fine speech,’ said Vigdjarf, lumbering up the steps to the fighting platform. Brand trailed behind him whilst the folk below hurried to complete their preparations. Sefna and Hrist took up positions on the hall roof with sheaves of the arrows they had worked through the night to trim and fletch. The geese of Branoc’s Tree had been plucked almost bald to provide their feathers, and when those were gone they had plucked the chickens. The orphans gathered a dozen horses behind the main hall, and the rest were driven away across the fields. Beornoth ordered some be kept in case all was lost, so that Lady Ælfflæd and the nuns could escape with an orphan in their lap, for Beornoth doubted Godric would stop his men from ravaging any woman found alive inside the defences.
‘Here comes the traitor,’ said Lady Ælfflæd. Godric rode towards Branoc’s Tree trailed by his hearth troop in their shining mail and tall spears. His men trailed behind him, their numbers spreading out to encircle Branoc’s Tree.
‘Let’s see what he has to say,’ said Beornoth. ‘Make ready and push the warriors out to the old walls.’ Vigdjarf and Brand nodded their understanding and went to make the defenders ready. Beornoth stood at the old, high palisade with Lady Ælfflæd, and from that side Godric would not notice that they had constructed a new wall inside the old fortifications. He would see one side of the burh scorched but still standing with Beornoth and Ælfflæd on its top, and then a ring of burned and collapsed fortifications which his men could probe and swarm with their greater numbers.
‘Lord Godric,’ Lady Ælfflæd said when he was close enough to hear. ‘Why have you assembled so many men? Do you come to do harm to the folk of Essex?’
‘Lady Ælfflæd,’ Godric said, reining his horse in. There was no disguising the surprise in his voice as he saw Byrhtnoth’s widow on the walls. ‘There are brigands behind those walls, and I come to restore order to the shire. I am surprised to see you standing with Beornoth, who is not even a man born of this shire. He is a known killer, and I will bring him to justice.’
‘It is you who breaks the king’s peace.’ She pointed down at him. ‘My lord husband is still warm in the ground, and you seek to usurp his title? Riding here on my husband’s horse, do you have no shame? Your father was a great man, and how could the apple have fallen so far from the tree?’
Godric stiffened at the accusation. ‘Beornoth, throw down your weapons and surrender to me, or every soul inside those walls will suffer for it. I give you my word that no quarter will be offered to any who fight against me today.’
‘Your word?’ said Lady Ælfflæd. ‘Is that word the same as the oath you swore to fight and die for my husband?’
‘You have my terms.’
‘We can settle this now, you and I,’ Beornoth said, and he rested his sword across his shoulder. ‘I, Beornoth, king’s thegn, and I outrank you here, Godric of Essex. As did Hrodgar, who you sent a child to kill. An innocent boy whom you corrupted and turned into a murderer. Hell beckons to you, Godric-traitor, its mouth gapes and yawns to suck you into the fires for eternity. Remove your men from the field and we shall pardon them. But you and I will fight, and one of us will die. We can settle this without further bloodshed. I only come for your head, and for your traitor’s soul.’
‘Why would I fight you when I have more men? I will enjoy watching you die, Beornoth. You are a fool with your belligerent talk of combat and honour. Always you tried to belittle me, thinking yourself the great warrior and sucking up all the glory, leaving none for the rest of us who fought just as bravely as you. You are no king’s thegn; this was your heriot, and you lost it. You are nothing, a man of nowhere with no lord. A masterless man worth less than a sliver of wet pig shit.’
‘Come and die, then,’ said Beornoth. He raised his sword to his lips and kissed the cold blade, and Godric rode back to his men. They spread around Branoc’s Tree with leering faces, weapons clutched in dirty fists, hungry for murder and plunder. But Beornoth was ready, and if this was to be his last battle, then he would die with honour.
25
Beornoth left the fighting platform and strode amongst the defenders. He clasped wrists with the fyrd men who had come to reclaim their honour and with the Vikings, who would stand and fight to defend a scrap of Essex with their lives. Lady Ælfflæd, Abbess Agatha and the nuns ushered the orphans inside Beornoth’s old hall. The lady had them gather as much cloth or wool as they could find, and the abbess boiled water in a cauldron over the hall hearth. They made ready to treat the injured, and Beornoth touched a hand to his own scars, hoping to God that he wouldn’t be one of the men writhing in pain in the floor rushes as the nuns staunched his wounds. For men would die today, women too, perhaps, and that thought led Beornoth to the outskirts of the fortification. He checked the piles of rocks and wooden spears and was careful not to tread on the branch-marked pits. The defenders followed him, the chink of chain mail and the creak of leather and the heavy footsteps of boots loud as they gathered around Beornoth in the moments before the fight.
‘Take the north outer wall,’ Beornoth said to Thered, and the ealdorman took his own warriors, and ten of the men the lady had brought from Rettendon. They went armed with shields and spears and would hold that side of the burh for as long as they could. ‘Dolgfinnr and Vigdjarf, take the south.’ The Vikings took their warriors with their sharp axes and long beards, and as they marched, they sang a battle hymn to Odin in Norse, a song of great heroes and brave warriors sailing across wild seas. Hrist and Sefna, along with Dudda and his long war bow, waited on the hall roof, strings hooked on to the horn nocks at either end of their staves.
Beornoth took the eastern defences, and he stood within a hole in the old palisade, where the defenders had removed an entire section of wall and cut into the shorter timbers which now formed the inner wall. Beornoth stood tall and broad-shouldered in that space. He wore his helmet, his byrnie coat of chain mail and carried a heavy shield ringed and bossed with iron. Beornoth wore the king’s sword belted at his waist and his seax rested in its sheath, which hung at the small of his back. He held an aesc spear, and he stood high and proud. Beornoth stared at Godric’s army, and he wanted them to know they faced a lord of war.
‘Bastards are drinking themselves stupid,’ said Brand. Sefna had braided his golden beard into a rope which hung over his byrnie, and he had left his long hair loose about his shoulders. Brand held a shield in his left hand and his Viking axe in his right.
‘They seek the courage to fight in the bottom of ale skins. Let them come to us drunk. It makes them easier to kill,’ said Beornoth. Godric had stayed on the western side of Branoc’s Tree with his hearth troop, and Beornoth had put most of the fyrd men on that side of the wall where the palisade’s inner fighting platform would allow them to defend the wall easily against any attack. Godric and his men remained mounted, and Beornoth thought the traitor would ride around the defences and look for a weak point, and then drive his hearth troop, and the few thegns who had rallied to his cause, into that gap like rats. They were Godric’s best troops, his true warriors, and Godric would depend on them to carry the day. Just as Beornoth knew that Godric’s death would end the battle, so Godric would assume that Beornoth’s death would cause the defenders to panic and crumble.
‘There’s that big, toothless bastard,’ said Brand, and he pointed his axe to where a colossal figure stalked amongst Godric’s war band. It was Ansgar the Giant, unmistakable as he towered over the rest of the attackers, hulking and lumbering amongst them. He carried two axes, one in each fist, just as he had at Hareswood, and Beornoth shuddered at the thought of fighting that monster again.
Godric’s men drank and shouted insults. They huddled in small bands and urged each other forward. A pack would dash forwards and then halt, waving their weapons and roaring at the burh, but would then shrink away as none could find the courage to attack the walls. It was no easy thing to risk one’s life, knowing that sharp blades awaited. To risk death, or perhaps worse, to suffer the terrible wound that does not kill. To lose an arm, a leg, or to be blinded. Such a man might live after weeks of mind-bending pain and infection, only to spend the rest of his life as a beggar, reliant on the kindness and charity of others for food and shelter. That was the fate the men in Godric’s army faced, and they saw Beornoth and knew of his reputation and they would not come.
The afternoon drew on with no attack, and the abbess and her nuns went amongst the defenders with ale, water, cheese and honey. Beornoth and Brand ate together and leaned against the broken wall. The afternoon drew on, and still the enemy could not find the will to attack.
‘Here we go,’ said Brand. Godric rode amongst his warriors, prancing on his black horse, and he shouted at them, waving his hands and pointing at Branoc’s Tree. The giant strode forwards, pushing and dragging at those around him, and a line of men went reluctantly with him. It was not a solid line of warriors with interlocked shields like Beornoth would expect to see on a battlefield, but a ragged line of men with squinting eyes, grizzled beards and crooked grins. These were the bravest of Godric’s band of killers and thieves, and the giant roared at their centre, waving his two axes and urging them to bravery. The rest came behind, the not so brave, the ones who would hang back until there was an opportunity to strike a blow against an injured man, or until the defences broke and they could run into the burh and kill the meek or ransack buildings for plunder.
Godric rode around the walls to the south, to urge his men on that side to attack at the same time. A concerted attack on each side of the fort would allow Godric to stretch the defenders and make the best use of his far greater numbers. Beornoth was ready for them. The weight of his shield was comforting, and he closed his eyes for a moment. He remembered his dead daughters and the sight of his beloved Eawynn, brutalised and lying with her throat cut on a day when violence had come to his home, and he had not been there to defend them. That made his chest heave, and his teeth grind in anger, cheek muscles working beneath his beard. Hate and anger fuelled a warrior. They were what gave a man the savagery and cruelty he needed to kill, stab and slaughter other men. Beornoth let his memories wander to Maldon then, to his dead friends and their rotting heads outside Olaf Tryggvason’s camp. That set a fire in his belly and Beornoth’s eyes popped open. He bared his teeth and raised his spear and bellowed like a madman. The men behind him took up that call, and it spread around the walls of Branoc’s Tree like a brush fire, igniting the defenders and stoking their hearts to courage.
