Bernard Cornwell - The Empty Throne

Bishop Wulfheard climbed the dais. I feared he would deliver another sermon, but instead he rapped on the wooden boards with the base of his staff, and when silence fell over the hall contented himself with a brief blessing. Æthelhelm, I noticed, took a modest place to one side of the assembly, while Eardwulf stood against the other wall and between them the leading men of Mercia sat on uncomfortable benches. Æthelred’s household warriors lined the walls, the only men allowed to carry weapons in the hall. My son slipped through the door and crouched beside me. ‘The swords are safe,’ he muttered.

‘Sihtric’s there?’

‘He is.’

Bishop Wulfheard spoke so softly that I had to lean forward to hear what he said, and leaning forward hurt me. I endured the pain to listen. It was the Lord Æthelred’s pleasure, the bishop said, to see the kingdom of Mercia safer and larger than it had been for many years. ‘We have gained land by the strength of our swords,’ Wulfheard said, ‘and by the grace of God we have driven the pagans from the fields our forefathers tilled. We thank God for this!’

‘Amen,’ Lord Æthelhelm interjected loudly.

‘We owe this blessing,’ Wulfheard continued, ‘to the victory won last year by our Lord Æthelred with the help of his staunch West Saxon allies,’ he gestured towards Æthelhelm and the hall was filled with the noise of men stamping their feet in approbation. The bastard, I thought. Æthelred had been wounded from behind, and the battle had been gained by my men, not his.

The bishop waited for silence. ‘We have gained land,’ he went on, ‘good farmland, and it is Lord Æthelred’s pleasure to grant that land to those who fought for him last year,’ and the bishop pointed to a table at the side of the hall where two priests sat behind a heap of documents. The bribe was obvious. Support whatever Æthelred proposed and a man could expect a grant of land.

‘There’ll be none for me,’ I growled.

Finan chuckled. ‘He’ll give you enough land for a grave, lord.’

‘And yet,’ the bishop was speaking a little louder now, which meant I could lean back against the wall, ‘the pagans still hold towns which were a part of our ancient kingdom. Our land is still fouled by their presence, and if we are to bequeath to our children the fields that our forefathers ploughed then we must gird our loins and expel the heathen just as Joshua drove out the sinners of Jericho!’ He paused, perhaps expecting to hear foot-stamping again, but the hall was quiet. He was suggesting we had to fight, which we did, but Bishop Wulfheard was no man to inspire others to the bloody business of facing a shield wall of snarling spear-Danes.

‘But we shall not fight alone,’ the bishop continued. ‘The Lord Æthelhelm has come from Wessex to assure us, indeed to promise us, that the forces of Wessex will fight beside us!’

That provoked applause. Someone else would do the fighting, it seemed, and men stamped their feet as Æthelhelm climbed the wooden steps to the dais. He smiled at the hall, a big man, easy in his authority. A gold chain glinted from his mail-clad breast. ‘I have no right to speak at this noble gathering,’ he said modestly, his rich voice filling the hall, ‘but with Lord Æthelred’s permission?’ He turned and Æthelred managed to nod.

‘My king,’ Æthelhelm said, ‘prays daily for the kingdom of Mercia. He prays that the pagans will be defeated. He thanks God for the victory you gained last year and, my lords, let us not forget that it was the Lord Uhtred who led that fight! Who suffered in that fight! Who trapped the heathen and delivered them to our swords!’

That was a surprise. There was not a man in the hall who did not know that I was an enemy to Æthelred, yet here, in Æthelred’s own hall, I was being praised? Men turned to look at me, then one or two started to stamp their feet and soon the great hall was filled with noise. Even Æthelred managed to rap the arm of his chair twice. Æthelhelm beamed and I kept a straight face, wondering what serpent was hidden in this unexpected flattery.

‘It is the pleasure of my king,’ Æthelhelm waited for the racket to subside, ‘to keep a large force in Lundene, which army will be ever ready to oppose the Danes who infest the eastern parts of our land.’ That was greeted by silence, though it was hardly a surprise. Lundene, the greatest town of Britain, was part of Mercia, but it had been under West Saxon rule for years now. What Æthelhelm meant, and was not quite making plain, was that the city would now formally become a part of Wessex, and the men in the hall understood that. They might not like it, but if that was the price of West Saxon help against the Danes then it was already paid and so was acceptable.

‘We shall keep that mighty army in the east,’ Æthelhelm said, ‘an army dedicated to the task of bringing East Anglia back to Saxon rule. And you, my lords, will keep an army here, in the west, and together we shall clear the heathen from our land! We shall fight together!’ He paused, staring around the hall, then repeated the last word. ‘Together!’

He stopped there. It was a very abrupt ending. He smiled at the bishop, smiled at the silent men on the benches beneath him, then stepped back down to the floor. ‘Together,’ he had said, by which he surely meant a forced marriage between Wessex and Mercia. The serpent, I thought, was about to be let loose.

Bishop Wulfheard had sat through Æthelhelm’s words, but now stood again. ‘It is necessary, lords,’ he said, ‘that we keep an army of Mercia that will free the northern part of our land of the last pagans and so spread the rule of Christ to every part of our ancient kingdom.’ Someone in the hall began to speak, though I could not catch the words, and the bishop interrupted him. ‘The new lands that we grant will pay for the warriors we need,’ he said sharply, and his words stilled any protest that might have been made. Doubtless the protest had been about the cost of keeping a permanent army. An army has to be fed, paid, armed, and supplied with horses, weapons, armour, shields and training, and the Witan had scented new taxes, but the bishop seemed to be suggesting that the captured Danish farmlands would pay for the army. And so they might, I thought, and it was not a bad idea either. We had defeated the Danes, driven them from great swathes of Mercian land, and it made sense to keep them running. That was what Æthelflaed was doing near Ceaster, but she was doing it without the support of her husband’s money or men.

‘And an army needs a leader,’ Bishop Wulfheard said.

The serpent was flickering its tongue now.

There was silence in the hall.

‘We have thought long about this,’ Wulfheard said piously, ‘and we have prayed too! We have laid the problem before Almighty God and he, in his omniscience, has suggested an answer.’

The serpent slithered into the light, small eyes glinting.

‘There are a dozen men in this hall,’ the bishop continued, ‘who could lead an army against the heathen, but to raise one man above the rest is to provoke jealousy. If the Lord Uhtred was well then there would be no other choice!’ You lying bastard, I thought. ‘And we all pray for the Lord Uhtred’s recovery,’ the bishop went on, ‘but until that happy day we need a man of proven ability, of fearless character, and of godly reputation.’

Eardwulf. Every eye in the hall looked at him, and I sensed rebellion stirring among the ealdormen. Eardwulf was not one of them. He was an upstart who owed his command of Æthelred’s household warriors to his sister, Eadith, who shared Æthelred’s bed. I had half expected to see her at the Witan, perhaps pretending to be Æthelred’s nurse, but she had the sense, or someone had the sense, to make sure she had stayed hidden.