Hereward 03 - End of Days (32 page)

Deda looked around to make sure they were not being watched, and then guided her to where two horses were tethered.

‘Are you well enough to ride?’ he asked. When she nodded, he continued, ‘We cannot go to Ely. It is no longer safe there. But I will take you to your village and leave some coin with your neighbours so they can keep you through the cold season.’

‘And what now for you?’ she asked, trying to hide her worry.

‘I have sworn my sword to the king,’ Deda replied. ‘I must fight for him at Ely.’

Rowena stared at him in disbelief for a moment, but she thought she understood. ‘I … I would not see you harmed,’ she blurted, surprising herself.

The knight grinned. ‘Ah, that is one of my greatest wishes too.’ He bowed. ‘You have brought some light into my life, Rowena of the English. If you knew me, you would realize that is a wondrous thing.’

She felt puzzled by his words, but he would say no more. Within moments, they were riding into the storm. Branduna fell behind her, and the miseries of the life she had created for herself. What lay ahead, she could not tell.

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY
-S
EVEN

AT THE EDGE
of the minster enclosure, black smoke swirled up into the storm. Roaring flames lit grim faces as a small crowd of mourners stared into the searing heart of Madulf’s pyre. Pounding rain drenched them all, but none cared. Every loss felt like a knife to the heart, for they were kin in all but name, with bonds forged by suffering and sacrifice, Hereward thought, looking around.

His silver hair plastered to his scalp, Thurstan stood head bowed and hands clasped in the shadow of the church. Exhausted, it seemed. He had said his godly words, but whether they had brought any comfort to Sighard the Mercian could not tell. The young man stood closest to the fire, seemingly oblivious of the heat. His eyes were hollow and he stared too long and too hard.

Alric leaned in and whispered, ‘If only we could have given Madulf a good Christian burial.’

‘We do what we can. In flames, he is still committed to God. This is the old way.’

The monk nodded. Since the streams of English refugees had flooded to Ely, the churchyard had filled to the brim. And so, at Kraki’s suggestion, they had set aside a corner of the minster
enclosure for the burnings. But this pyre had been arranged with what could have appeared unseemly haste in other, more peaceful times. This day they could not even allow Sighard time to grieve.

Hereward half turned and peered through the sheets of rain down the slopes of the isle to the walls. Somewhere in the gloom beyond, the Normans were gathering. Still he could not believe that it had come to this. From near-victory to a desperate defence in the time it had taken for the storm to sweep in. Now they were no longer the masters of their days yet to come. They could only pray.

He strode forward and rested a hand on Sighard’s shoulder. Rigid beneath his touch, the young man did not turn or even acknowledge his presence. Hereward winced at the sharp memory of his own grief at Turfrida’s graveside. Sighard would not recover easily from this day.

He pulled up his hood and turned away. As Alric followed Thurstan into the church, the other mourners took his lead and in ones and twos they drifted away from the pyre and out of the minster enclosure. Only Sighard remained, an unmoving figure silhouetted against the flames.

Beyond the minster gates, Hereward heaved in a deep breath. The thatched roofs of Ely fell away from him down the hillside. In the eyes of the king, every man and woman there was as much an enemy as the English warriors. Leatherworker and smith, goodwife and farmer, all would pay the price.

‘Worry not. They knew.’ Acha appeared at his shoulder, following his gaze down the hillside. ‘Everyone who answered your call knew. We had our hopes of a life free of the Norman yoke …’ she paused, her eyes growing faraway, ‘and of a return to the days we once lived … but none had any doubt that the risk was great.’ She nodded to herself. ‘It was a risk worth taking.’

‘We are not done yet.’

She smiled in agreement, refusing to acknowledge the lie in his words. ‘We still have fight left in us.’

Kraki, Guthrinc and Hengist strode up. ‘What now?’ the Viking said.

‘We ready for battle,’ Hereward replied. ‘Gather the army, here, on the slope facing the gates. The Normans will attack from the front. It is the easiest route up, and they will have the numbers in no time. Our shield walls will remain strong?’

Kraki nodded.

‘I will gather the woodworkers and their men, and any timber they have. The walls are solid, but the Normans will try to break them or burn them and we must be ready,’ Guthrinc said.

Hereward scanned the hillside. ‘I have work for you, hard work,’ he said, turning to Hengist. ‘Bring as many men as you can with shovels. We will arrange a surprise for the bastards should they enter Ely.’ He grinned. Hengist clapped his hands with glee like a child. ‘The Normans will expect us to lie down like lambs,’ the Mercian continued. ‘But the isle will run red with their blood. Are you ready?’

The three men grinned in turn. To their credit, none asked if they would win. No warrior went into battle thinking of victory, only of the fight itself. Fired up by the thought of the coming war, they set off down the slope, laughing with each other. Hereward saw Acha slip a hand through Kraki’s arm as she joined them; a small thing, but he felt it warm his heart.

As he watched them disappear among the storm-lashed huts, he realized how much the gyre of his life had turned. In the hall of his father, he had never felt more alone. The hours had been filled with pain and he had come to believe he would never find anything of value in the grim procession of days. And yet here, at the end, he felt something like peace. He marvelled at the strangeness of it.

A moment later, Alric hurried from the church and together they walked down the road through Ely. ‘Thurstan would know your plans,’ the monk said.

‘If he is a part of my plans, I will tell him.’

‘He is afraid, you know that.’

‘Then he must put his faith in God, and in the men who will give their lives to defend him from the king’s wrath.’

At the walls, they clambered on to the walkway. The gusting wind met them, tearing at their hair and lashing their cloaks.

‘Here we are, two drowned rats,’ Alric said. ‘A fine sight to greet the king.’

Hereward looked out across the fenlands. ‘I have only one regret – that I did not make my brother pay for his crime.’

‘You must put that out of your mind.’ The monk shook the rain from himself. ‘You think it will make amends to end your brother’s days with your sword. It will not. Turfrida will still be dead, and you will carry with you for the rest of your days the knowledge that you have slaughtered someone you once loved. You will never escape that. It will gnaw away at you, and given time it will destroy you. I would not wish that on any man.’

The Mercian heard the pain beneath the other man’s words and knew he was speaking from experience. ‘Good words, but they matter little now. I will not see Redwald again. At heart he is a coward and he would not risk his neck in the battle we are going to see here.’

After a moment, the monk said, ‘If that is your only regret, you have had a good life.’

‘Aye,’ Hereward replied. ‘I have had a good life.’

The Mercian stood in silence, watching the ash trees thrash and the water stream down to the black meres, remembering. Only the days since Alric had joined him on the road seemed to be bright with colour. All that had happened before had faded into a fenland mist.

All endings came too soon, but this one sooner than most.

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY
-E
IGHT

COLD SWEAT TRICKLED
down Redwald’s back. He glanced this way and that as he loped along the narrow track through the desolate wetlands. Threat was everywhere. An English arrow whisking out of the gloom of the storm. An unseen enemy in the tangled willow copses or the sedge or the reed-beds that seemed to stretch for miles, ready to rise up with a spear and rip him apart. He choked back his fear but his throat felt too narrow.

Even the natural world seemed to be conspiring against him. Under the lowering black clouds, it had grown so dark he could barely see to put one foot in front of the other. The torrent turned the water to his left into an angry sea and made the bog to his right even more fluid. One wrong step and he would be gone. The raindrops rattled off his helm like hailstones, blinding him. The bitter cold numbed his body until he could barely feel the flints beneath his feet.

Amid it all, he felt alone in the whole world. The path wound round obstacles through the half-light so that he could not see the men ahead or behind. He could not hear the thunder of their feet, or the rattle of their shields. Only the rushing of the storm throbbed in his ears.

Redwald swallowed. How had it come to this? Why would the king wish to punish him by sending him into the very heart of a battle that would be bloody indeed? He had only ever been loyal.

As he rounded a leaning ash tree, he scrambled to a halt, almost plunging into the churning grey water. Three Norman soldiers and the mad Viking Harald Redteeth clustered on the track. Just beyond them he glimpsed another soldier hesitantly walking towards a copse. He seemed taller than the others and his gait was rolling as if he walked upon the deck of a storm-tossed ship. Redwald gagged and covered his mouth as he breathed in the fruity stink of rot.

The Viking glanced back at him and grinned. ‘Death is always closer than you think, and sometimes he is a friend.’

Redwald leaned forward to see why the men had come to a halt. The waters had risen, making a stretch of the causeway ahead impassable. But the cunning Normans would not be deterred. They had made a bridge of dead horses – no doubt killed in the English attack on the causeway – each one strapped to the next with hemp rope, the bellies bloated with the gases of decay. As one knight crossed to the higher ground beyond, the next soldier clambered on, holding his arms wide to balance himself.

When it was Redwald’s turn to cross, he screwed his eyes shut and felt with his feet. The corpses shifted and belched beneath him. His gorge rose at the reek. Halfway across, his shoes slid out from under him and he crashed down, his face pressing deep into hide slippery with putrefaction and squirming with maggots. As he choked and clawed his way like a babe over the remaining bodies, Harald Redteeth’s mocking laughter rang through the storm.

‘How do you like life as a warrior?’ the Viking taunted.

Redwald collapsed on to solid ground, his forehead almost touching the sodden earth as he sucked in clean air. Hunched over him, Redteeth yelled above the pounding of the rain, ‘This is the world of a fighting man: sweat and terror and blood and
shit and piss. How do you like it, eh?’ The Northman laughed with contempt and stalked away. Redwald would have killed him then and there, while his back was turned, if he could have got away with it.

With his heart sinking, he joined the flow of men weaving along the next leg of the track. After a while, he heard a tremendous roaring rushing through the trees. As he stepped out of the gloom of the woods, he found himself on the muddy bank of a swollen river. Stretched out on either side of him, the soldiers who had preceded him stared into the treacherous grey waters.

He wiped the driving rain from his eyes and followed their gaze. Several small boats had been lashed together and fastened to stakes hammered into the bank. Some of the soldiers had started to fix timber across the boats to create a makeshift bridge. But the rushing currents tore at the feeble structure. Redwald heaved a sigh of relief when he saw it would not survive much longer. They would have to turn back.

As he edged away he looked upriver, through the sheets of rain, and glimpsed pinpricks of light glowing in the grey distance. They were drawing closer. Soon enough he saw they were lanterns swinging in the prows of boats sweeping along in the raging torrent. Cloaked and hooded men hunched over their oars, heads bowed into the blasting storm. Astern, another man struggled with the tiller.

‘Hands to the bridge,’ a voice boomed. ‘We will not be turned back by a little water.’

Redwald was astonished to see the king striding up from the track. He could have been warming himself at Branduna while he waited for the route to Ely to be made secure, yet there he was, near the front of the attacking force. The soldiers parted as the monarch marched to the river’s edge and scrutinized the first section of the bridge. His nose wrinkled in disgust at what he no doubt considered was a pitiful effort, and then he roared his disapproval at the commander he had placed in charge. Redwald watched the hardened soldiers cower.

‘We have tamed the great seas,’ the king bellowed. ‘And you say this stream of piss will stop us reaching our prey?’ Redwald marvelled at the monarch’s determination. Now he understood how the Normans had crushed everything in their path. Not even the fury of the elements would force William off the course he had chosen.

‘The waters are too dangerous,’ the commander protested. ‘A man must wade through them to anchor the boats.’

‘Then be that man,’ William bellowed. He hooked his huge hands in the commander’s hauberk and heaved. So great was his strength that the soldier flew through the air, crashed on to the slick timbers of the bridge and skidded towards the rushing grey river and certain death. Flailing, he managed at the last to find a handhold and jerked to a halt half over the end, his nose a hand’s width from the torrent.

The king had already forgotten him. He yelled for the boats to be brought in. Struggling against the current, the oarsmen steered in the first of the vessels. They fought to keep it in line with the already-moored boats.

Standing on the edge, the commander peered into the river. He had only moments before the boat would be torn away. He flashed one despairing glance at the king, and, with shaking hands, grabbed the end of a rope and lowered himself into the current. Instantly, the river threatened to tear him away. Clawing at the edge of the bridge, he made a feeble effort to loop the rope around the boat.