Bernard Cornwell - Death of Kings

I took Finan, Sigunn, Ludda, Sihtric and four other men and broke away from the road, leaving Osferth with orders to keep going until he reached Eanulfsbirig, but not to cross the river there.

While we scouted. There is an art to scouting land. Normally I would have two pairs of horsemen working either side of the road. One pair, watched by another, would go forward to investigate hills or woodlands, and only when they were certain that no enemy was in sight would they signal their comrades who, in turn, would investigate the next stretch of country, but I had no time for such caution. Instead we rode hard. I had given Ludda a mail coat, a helmet and a sword, while Sigunn, who rode a horse as well as any man, was in a great cloak of otter fur.

We passed Eanulfsbirig late in the morning. We went well to the west of the small settlement and I paused in dark winter trees to stare at the glint of river, the bridge and the tiny thatched houses that leaked a small smoke into the clear sky. ‘No one there,’ Finan said after a while. I trusted his eyes better than mine. ‘At least no one to worry about.’

‘Unless they’re in the houses,’ I suggested.

‘They wouldn’t take their horses inside,’ Finan said, ‘but you want me to find out?’ I shook my head. I doubted the Danes were there. Maybe they were nowhere. My suspicion was that they watched Eanulfsbirig, though perhaps from the river’s far bank. There were trees beyond the far river meadows and an army could have been hidden in their undergrowth. I assumed that Sigurd would want us to cross the river before he attacked, so that our backs were to the stream, but he would also want to secure the bridge to prevent our escape. Or perhaps, even now, Sigurd was in his hall drinking mead and I was just imagining the danger. ‘Keep going north,’ I said, and we pushed the horses across the furrows of a field planted with winter wheat.

‘What are you expecting, lord?’ Ludda asked me.

‘For you to keep your mouth shut if we meet any Danes,’ I said.

‘I think I’d want to do that,’ he said fervently.

‘And pray we haven’t passed the bastards,’ I said. I worried that Osferth might be walking into ambush, yet my instincts told me we still had not found the enemy. If there was an enemy. It seemed to me that the bridge at Eanulfsbirig was the ideal place for Sigurd to ambush us, but as far as I could see there were no men on this side of the Use, and he would surely want them on both banks.

We rode more cautiously now, staying among trees as we probed northwards. We were beyond the route that Sigurd would expect me to take and if he did have men waiting to cut off our retreat then I expected to find them, yet the winter countryside was cold and silent and empty. I was beginning to think that my fears were misplaced, that no danger threatened us, and then, quite suddenly, there was something strange.

We had gone perhaps three miles beyond Eanulfsbirig and were among waterlogged fields and small coppiced woods with the river a half-mile to our right. A smear of smoke rose from a copse on the river’s far bank and I gave it no thought, assuming it was a cottage hidden among the trees, but Finan saw something more. ‘Lord?’ he said, and I curbed the horse and saw where he pointed. The river here made a great swirling bend to the east and, at the bend’s farthest point, beneath the bare branches of willows, were the unmistakable shapes of two ship prows. Beast-heads. I had not seen them until Finan pointed to them, and the Irishman had the sharpest eyes of any man I ever met. ‘Two ships,’ he said.

The two ships had no masts, presumably because they had been rowed beneath the bridge at Huntandon. Were they East Anglian? I stared, and could see no men, but the hulls were hidden beneath the thick growth of the river bank. Yet the rearing prows told me two ships were in a place where I had expected none. Behind me Ludda was again saying how Danish raiders had once rowed all the way to Eanulfsbirig. ‘Be quiet,’ I told him.

‘Yes, lord.’

‘Maybe they’re wintering the ships there?’ Finan suggested.

I shook my head. ‘They’d drag them out of the water for the winter. And why are they showing their beast-heads?’ We only put the dragon or wolf heads on our ships when we are in enemy waters, which suggested these two ships were not East Anglian. I twisted in the saddle to look at Ludda. ‘Remember to keep your mouth closed.’

‘Yes, lord,’ he said, though his eyes were bright. Our magician was enjoying being a warrior.

‘And the rest of you,’ I said, ‘make sure your crosses are hidden.’ Most of my men were Christians and wore a cross just as I wore a hammer. I watched as they hid their talismans. I left my hammer showing.

We kicked the horses out of the wood and crossed the meadow. We had not gone halfway before one of the prow-mounted beasts moved. The two ships were moored against the farther bank, but one of them now came across the river and three men scrambled up from its bows. They were in mail. I held my hands high to show I was not holding a weapon, and let my tired horse walk slowly towards them. ‘Who are you?’ one of them challenged me. He shouted in Danish, but what puzzled me was the cross he wore over his mail. It was a wooden cross with a small silver figure of Christ pinned to the crossbar. Maybe it was plunder? I could not imagine any of Sigurd’s men being Christians, yet the ships were surely Danish. Beyond him I could now see more men, maybe forty altogether, waiting in the two ships.

I stopped to let the man look at me. He saw a lord in expensive war gear with silver trappings on his harness, arm rings glinting in the sun, and a hammer of Thor prominent about my neck. ‘Who are you, lord?’ he asked respectfully.

‘I am Haakon Haakonson,’ I invented the name, ‘and I serve the Jarl Haesten.’ That was my story, that I was one of Haesten’s men. I had to assume that none of Sigurd’s followers would be familiar with Haesten’s troops and so would not question me too closely, and if they did then Sigunn, who had once been part of Haesten’s company, would provide the answers. That was why I had brought her.

‘Ivann Ivarrson,’ the man named himself. He was reassured that I spoke Danish, but he was still wary. ‘Your business?’ he asked, though still in a respectful voice.

‘We seek Jarl Jorven,’ I said, choosing the name of the man whose homestead we had skirted with Beortsig.

‘Jorven?’

‘He serves Jarl Sigurd,’ I said.

‘And is with him?’ Ivann asked, and did not seem in the least surprised that I sought one of Sigurd’s men so far from Sigurd’s territory, and that was my first confirmation that Sigurd was indeed nearby. He had left his lands and he was on Eohric’s country where he had no business except to prevent the treaty from being signed.

‘That’s what I was told,’ I said airily.

‘Then he’s across the river,’ Ivann said, then hesitated. ‘Lord?’ His voice was full of caution now. ‘Might I ask you a question?’

‘You can ask,’ I said grandly.

‘You mean Jorven harm, lord?’

I laughed at that. ‘I do him a service,’ I said, then twisted in the saddle and pulled the cloak-hood from Sigunn’s head. ‘She ran away from him,’ I explained, ‘and Jarl Haesten thinks he would like her back.’

Ivann’s eyes widened. Sigunn was a beauty, pale and fragile looking, and she had the sense to look frightened as Ivann and his men examined her. ‘Any man would want her back,’ Ivann said.

‘Jorven will doubtless punish the bitch,’ I said carelessly, ‘but maybe he’ll let you use her first?’ I pulled the hood back, shadowing her face again. ‘You serve Jarl Sigurd?’ I asked Ivann.

‘We serve King Eohric,’ he said.