The Pale Horseman (38 page)

'Guthrum will lead four thousand men,' I said, 'at least.'

'At least?'

'Depends how many come from Mercia,' I said, then thought for a heartbeat, 'but I expect
four thousand.'

'And Wessex?'

'The same,' I said. I was lying. With enormous luck we could assemble three thousand, but
I doubted it. Two thousand? Not likely, but possible. My real fear was that Alfred would
raise his banner and no one would come, or that only a few hundred men would arrive. We could
lead three hundred from Æthelingaeg, but what could three hundred do against Guthrum's great
army?

Alfred also worried about numbers, and he sent me to Hamptonscir to discover how much
of the shire was occupied by the Danes. I found them well entrenched in the north, but the
south of the shire was free of them and in Hamtun, where Alfred's fleet was based, the
warships were still drawn up on the beach. Burgweard, the fleet's commander, had over a
hundred men in the town, all that was left of his crews, and he had them manning the palisade.
He claimed he could not leave Hamtun for fear that the Danes would attack and capture the
ships, but I had Alfred's scrap of parchment with his dragon seal on it, and I used it to
order him to keep thirty men to protect the ships and bring the rest to Alfred.

'When?' he asked gloomily.

'When you're summoned,' I said, 'but it will be soon. And you're to raise the local fyrd
too. Bring them.'

'And if the Danes come here?' he asked, 'if they come by sea?'

'Then we lose the fleet,' I said, 'and we build another.'

His fear was real enough. Danish ships were off the south coast again. For the moment,
rather than attempt an invasion, they were being Vikings. They landed, raided, raped,
burned, stole and went to sea again, but they were numerous enough for Alfred to worry that a
whole army might land somewhere on the coast and march against him. We were harassed by that
fear and by the knowledge that we were few and the enemy numerous, and that the enemy's
horses were fattening on the new grass.

'Ascension Day,' Alfred announced on the day I returned from Hamtun.

That was the day we should be ready in Æthelingaeg, and on the Sunday after, which was the
Feast of Saint Monica, we would gather the fyrd, if there was a fyrd. Reports said the Danes
were readying to march and it was plain they would launch their attack south towards
Wintanceaster, the town that was the capital of Wessex, and to protect it, to bar Guthrum's
road south, the fyrd would gather at Egbert's Stone. I had never heard of the place, but
Leofric assured me it was an important spot, the place where King Egbert, Alfred's
grandfather, had given judgements.

'It isn't one stone,' he said, 'but three.'

'Three?'

'Two big pillars and another boulder on top. The giants made it in the old days.'

And so the summons was issued. Bring every man, the parchments instructed, bring every
weapon and say your prayers, for what is left of Wessex will meet at Egbert's Stone to carry
battle to the Danes, and no sooner was the summons sent than disaster struck. It came just a
week before the fyrd was to gather.

Huppa, Ealdorman of Thornsaeta, wrote that forty Danish ships were off his coast, and
that he dared not lead the fyrd away from their threat. Worse, because the Danes were so
numerous, he had begged Harald of Defnascir to lend him men.

That letter almost destroyed Alfred's spirits. He had clung to his dream of surprising
Guthrum by raising an unexpectedly powerful army, but all his hopes were now shredding
away. He had always been thin, but suddenly he looked haggard and he spent hours in the
church, wrestling with God, unable to understand why the Almighty had so suddenly turned
against him. And two days after the news of the Danish fleet, Svein of the White Horse led
three hundred mounted men in a raid against the hills on the edge of the swamp and, because
scores of men from the Sumorsaete fyrd had gathered in Æthelingaeg, Svein discovered and
stole their horses. We had neither the room nor the forage to keep many horses in
Æthelingaeg itself, and so they were pastured beyond the causeway, and I watched from the
fort as Svein, riding a white horse and wearing his white-plumed helmet and white cloak,
rounded up the beasts and drove them away. There was nothing I could do to stop him. I had
twenty men in the fort and Svein was leading hundreds.

'Why were the horses not guarded?' Alfred wanted to know.

'They were,' Wiglaf, Ealdorman of Sumorsaete, said, 'and the guards died.' He saw Alfred's
anger, but not his despair. 'We haven't seen a Dane here for weeks!' he pleaded, 'how were we
to know they'd come in force?'

'How many men died?'

'Only twelve.'

'Only?' Alfred asked, wincing, 'and how many horses lost?'

'Sixty-three.'

On the night before Ascension Day Alfred walked beside the river. Beocca, faithful as
a hound, followed him at a distance, wanting to offer the king God's reassurance, but
instead Alfred called to me. There was a moon, and its light shadowed his cheeks and made his
pale eyes look almost white.

'How many men will we have?' he asked abruptly.

I did not need to think about the answer. 'Two thousand.'

He nodded. He knew that number as well as I did.

'Maybe a few more,' I suggested.

He grunted at that. We would lead three hundred and fifty men from Æthelingaeg and Wiglaf,
Ealdorman of Sumorsaete, had promised a thousand, though in truth I doubted if that many
would come. The fyrd of Wiltunscir had been weakened by Wulfhere's defection, but the
southern part of the shire should yield five hundred men, and we could expect some from
Hamptonscir, but beyond that we would depend on whatever few men made it past the Danish
garrisons that now ringed the heartland of Wessex. If Defnascir and Thornsaeta had sent
their fyrds then we would have numbered closer to four thousand, but they were not
coming.

'And Guthrum?' Alfred asked, 'how many will he have?’

'Four thousand.'

'More like five,' Alfred said. He stared at the river that was running low between the
muddy banks. The water rippled about the wicker fish traps. 'So should we fight?'

‘What choice do we have?'

He smiled at that. 'We have a choice, Uhtred,' he assured me. 'We can run away. We can go to
Frankia. I could become a king in exile and pray that God brings me back.'

‘You think God will?'

‘No,' he admitted. If he ran away then he knew he would die in exile.

'So we fight,' I said.

'And on my conscience,' he said, 'I will for ever bear the weight of all those men who died
in a hopeless cause. Two thousand against five thousand? How can 1 justify leading so few
against so many?'

'You know how.'

'So I can be king?'

'So that we are not slaves in our own land,' I said.

He pondered that for a while. An owl flew low overhead, a sudden surprise of white
feathers and the rush of air across stubby wings. It was an omen, I knew, but of what kind?

'Perhaps we are being punished,' Alfred said.

'For what?'

'For taking the land from the Britons?'

That seemed nonsense to me. If Alfred's god wanted to punish him for his ancestors
having taken the land from the Britons, then why send the Danes? Why not send the Britons? God
could resurrect Arthur and let his people have their revenge, but why send a new people to
take the land?

'Do you want Wessex or not?' I asked harshly.

He said nothing for a while, then gave a sad smile. 'In my conscience,' he said, 'I can find
no hope for this fight, but as a Christian I must believe we can win it. God will not let us
lose.'

'Nor will this,' I said, and I slapped Serpent-Breath's hilt.

'So simple?' he asked.

'Life is simple,' I said. 'Ale, women, sword and reputation. Nothing else matters.'

He shook his head and I knew he was thinking about God and prayer and duty, but he did not
argue.

'So if you were I, Uhtred,' he said, 'would you march?'

'You've already made up your mind, lord,' I said, 'so why ask me?'

He nodded. A dog barked in the village and he turned to stare at the cottages and the hall
and the church he had made with its tall alder cross.

'Tomorrow,' he said, you will take a hundred horsemen and patrol ahead of the army.'

'Yes, lord.'

'And when we meet the enemy,' he went on, still staring at the cross, 'you will choose fifty
or sixty men from the bodyguard. The best you can find. And you will guard my banners.'

He did not say more, but nor did he need to. What he meant was that I was to take the best
warriors, the most savage men, the dangerous warriors who loved battle, and I was to lead
them in the place where the fight would be hardest, for an enemy loves to capture his foe's
banners. It was an honour to be asked and, if the battle was lost, an almost certain death
sentence.

'I shall do it gladly, lord,' I said, 'but ask a favour of you in return.'

'If I can,' he said guardedly.

'If you can,' I said, 'don't bury me. Burn my body on a pyre, and put a sword in my hand.'

He hesitated, then nodded, knowing he had agreed to a pagan funeral. 'I never told
you,' he said,

'that I am sorry about your son.'

'So am I, lord.'

'But he is with God, Uhtred, he is assuredly with God.'

'So I'm told, lord, so I'm told.'

And next day we marched. Fate is inexorable, and though numbers and reason told us we
could not win, we dared not lose and so we marched to Egbert's Stone.

We marched with ceremony. Twenty-three priests and eighteen monks formed our vanguard
and chanted a psalm as they led Alfred's forces away from the fort guarding the southern
trackway and east towards the heartland of Wessex.

They chanted in Latin so the words meant nothing to me, but Father Pyrlig had been given
use of one of Alfred's horses and, dressed in a leather coat and with a great sword strapped to
his side and with a stout-shafted hoar spear on one shoulder, he rode alongside me and
translated the words.

“'God,”' he said, '“you have abandoned me, you have scattered us, you are angry with us,
now turn to us again.” That sounds a reasonable request, doesn't it? You've kicked us in the
face, so now give us a cuddle, eh?'

'It really means that?'

'Not the bit about kicks and cuddles. That was me.' He grinned at me. 'I do miss war. Isn't
that a sin?'

'You've seen war?'

'Seen it? I was a warrior before I joined the church! Pyrlig the Fearless, they called me.
I killed four Saxons in a day once. All by myself and I had nothing but a spear. And they had
swords and shields, they did. Back home they made a song about me, but mind you, the Britons will
sing about anything. I can sing you the song, if you like? It tells how I slaughtered three
hundred and ninety-four Saxons in one day, but it's not entirely accurate.'

'So how many did you kill?'

'I told you. Four.' He laughed.

'So how did you learn English?'

'My mother was a Saxon, poor thing. She was taken in a raid on Mercia and became a
slave.'

'So why did you stop being a warrior?'

'Because I found God, Uhtred. Or God found me. And I was becoming too proud. Songs about
yourself go to your head and I was wickedly proud of myself, and pride is a terrible
thing.'

'It's a warrior's weapon,' I said.

'It is indeed,' he agreed, 'and that is why it is a terrible thing, and why I pray God
purges me of it.'

We were well ahead of the priests now, climbing towards the nearest hilltop to look north
and east for the enemy, but the churchmen's voices followed us, their chant strong in the
morning air.

'“Through God we shall do bravely,”' Father Pyrlig interpreted for me, '“and God shall
trample down our enemies”. Now there's a blessed thought for a fine morning, Lord Uhtred!'

'The Danes are saying their own prayers, father.'

'But to what god, eh? No point in shouting at a deaf man, is there?' He curbed his horse at
the hilltop and stared northwards. 'Not even a mouse stirring.'

'The Danes are watching,' I said, 'we can't see them, but they can see us.'

If they were watching then what they could see was Alfred's three hundred and fifty men
riding or walking away from the swamp, and in the distance another five or six hundred men
who were the fyrd from the western part of Sumorsaete who had camped to the south of the swamp
and now marched to join our smaller column. Most of the men from Æthelingaeg were real
soldiers, trained to stand in the shield wall, but we also had fifty of the marsh men. I had
wanted Eofer, the strong bowman, to come with us, but he could not fight without his niece
telling him what to do and I had no intention of taking a child to war and so we had left
Eofer behind. A good number of women and children were following the column, though
Alfred had sent Ælswith and his children south to Scireburnan under a guard of forty men.
We could hardly spare those men, but Alfred insisted his family go. Ælswith was to wait in
Scireburnan and, if news came that her husband was defeated and the Danes victorious, she
was to flee south to the coast and find a ship that would take her to Frankia. She was also
instructed to take with her whatever books she could find in Scireburnan, for Alfred
reckoned the Danes would burn every book in Wessex and so Æ1swith was to rescue the gospel
books and saints' lives and church fathers and histories and philosophers and thus raise her
son Edward to become a learned king in exile.

Iseult was with the army, walking with Hild and with Eanflaed who had upset Ælswith by
insisting on following Leofric. The women led packhorses which carried the army's
shields, food and spare spears. Nearly every woman was equipped with some kind of weapon. Even
Hild, a nun, wanted to take revenge on the Danes who had whored her and so carried a long,
narrow-bladed knife.