Bernard Cornwell - Death of Kings

‘You’re unhurt?’ I asked.

‘They were all very polite,’ she said, looking back at Sigebriht with a mocking expression.

‘There’s only four of them,’ I said, ‘so which one do you want me to kill first?’

Sigebriht drew his crystal-pommelled sword. I was ready to step back among the trees where the trunks would give me an advantage against a mounted man, but to my surprise he threw the sword so that it landed heavily in the dewy grass a few paces from me. ‘I yield to your mercy,’ Sigebriht said. His three men followed his example and threw their swords onto the ground.

‘Off your horses,’ I said, ‘all of you.’ I watched them dismount. ‘Now kneel.’ They knelt. ‘Give me one reason not to kill you,’ I said as I walked towards them.

‘We have yielded to you, lord,’ Sigebriht said, head lowered.

‘You yielded,’ I said, ‘because your two fools failed to kill me.’

‘They were not my fools, lord,’ Sigebriht said humbly, ‘they were Æthelwold’s men. These three are my men.’

‘Did he order those two idiots to attack me?’ I called back to Æthelflaed.

‘No,’ she said.

‘They wanted glory, lord,’ Sigebriht said, ‘they wanted to be known as the slayers of Uhtred.’

I touched the bloodied tip of Serpent-Breath to his cheek. ‘And what do you want, Sigebriht of Cent?’

‘To make my peace with the king, lord.’

‘Which king?’

‘There is only one king in Wessex, lord. King Edward.’

I let Serpent-Breath’s tip lift the long tail of fair hair tied with leather. The blade, I thought, would cut through his neck so easily. ‘Why do you seek peace with Edward?’

‘I was wrong, lord,’ Sigebriht said humbly.

‘Lady?’ I called, not taking my eyes from him.

‘They saw you following,’ Æthelflaed explained, ‘and this man,’ she pointed at Sigebriht, ‘offered to bring me back to you. He told Æthelwold that I would persuade you to join him.’

‘Did he believe that?’

‘I told him I would try and persuade you,’ she said, ‘and he believed me.’

‘He’s a fool,’ I said.

‘And instead I told Sigebriht to make his peace,’ Æthelflaed went on, ‘and that his best hope of living beyond today’s dusk was to abandon Æthelwold and swear allegiance to Edward.’

I put the sword under Sigebriht’s clean-shaven chin and tilted his face up towards me. He was so handsome, so bright-eyed, and in those eyes I could see no guile, only the eyes of a frightened man. Yet I knew I should kill him. I touched the sword-blade to the silk ribbon around his neck. ‘Tell me why I shouldn’t cut through your miserable neck,’ I ordered him.

‘I’ve yielded, lord,’ he said, ‘I beg mercy.’

‘What’s the ribbon?’ I asked, flicking the pink silk with Serpent-Breath’s tip and leaving a smear of blood.

‘It was a gift from a girl,’ he said.

‘The Lady Ecgwynn?’

He gazed up at me. ‘She was beautiful,’ he said wistfully, ‘she was like an angel, she drove men to madness.’

‘And she preferred Edward,’ I said.

‘And she’s dead, lord,’ Sigebriht said, ‘and I think King Edward regrets that as much as I do.’

‘Fight for someone who lives,’ Æthelflaed said, ‘not for the dead.’

‘I was wrong, lord,’ Sigebriht said, and I was not sure I believed him, and so I pressed the sword against his neck and saw the fear in his blue eyes.

‘It is my brother’s decision,’ Æthelflaed said gently, knowing what was in my mind.

I let him live.

That night, so we heard later, Æthelwold crossed the border into Mercia and kept riding north until he reached the safety of Sigurd’s hall. He had escaped.

Alfred was buried.

The burial took five hours of praying, chanting, weeping and preaching. The old king had been placed in an elm coffin painted with scenes from the lives of the saints, while the lid depicted a surprised looking Christ ascending into heaven. A splinter of the true cross was placed in the dead king’s hands and his head was pillowed by a gospel book. The elm coffin was sheathed in a lead box, which in turn was enclosed by a third casket, this one of cedar and carved with pictures of saints defying death. One saint was being burned, though the flames could not touch her, a second was being tortured yet was smiling forgiveness on her hapless tormentors, while a third was being pierced by spears and still was preaching. The whole cumbersome coffin was carried down to the crypt of the old church where it was sealed in a stone chamber where Alfred rested until the new church was finished, and then he was carried to the vault where he still lies. I remember Steapa weeping like a child. Beocca was in tears. Even Plegmund, that stern archbishop, was crying as he preached. He talked of Jacob’s ladder, which appeared in a dream described in the Christian scriptures, and Jacob, as he lay on his stony pillow beneath the ladder heard the voice of God. ‘The land on which you lie shall be given to your children and to their children’s children,’ Plegmund’s voice broke as he read the words, ‘and your children shall be like the dust of the earth and they shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and by you and your children shall all the families of the world bless themselves.’

‘Jacob’s dream was Alfred’s dream,’ Plegmund’s voice was hoarse by this point in his long sermon, ‘and Alfred now lies here, in this place, and this land shall be given to his children and to his children’s children till the day of judgement itself! And not just this land! Alfred dreamed that we Saxons should spread the light of the gospel through all Britain, and all other lands, until every voice on earth is lifted in praise of God Almighty.’

I remember smiling to myself. I stood at the back of the old church, watching the smoke from the incense burners swirl around the gilded rafters, and it amused me that Plegmund believed that we Saxons should spread like the dust of the earth to the north, south, east and west. We would be lucky if we kept what land we had, let alone spread, but the congregation was moved by Plegmund’s words. ‘The pagans press upon us,’ Plegmund declared, ‘they persecute us! Yet we shall preach to them and we shall pray for them, and we shall see them bow their knee to Almighty God and then Alfred’s dream will come true and there shall be rejoicing in heaven! God will preserve us!’

I should have listened more carefully to that sermon, but I was thinking of Æthelflaed and Fagranforda. I had asked Edward’s permission to go to Mercia, and his reply was to send Beocca to the Two Cranes. My old friend sat by the hearth and chided me for ignoring my eldest son. ‘I don’t ignore him,’ I said. ‘I’d like him to come to Fagranforda as well.’

‘And what will he do there?’

‘What he should do,’ I said, ‘train as a warrior.’

‘He wants to be a priest,’ Beocca said.

‘Then he’s no son of mine.’

Beocca sighed. ‘He’s a good boy! A very good boy.’

‘Tell him to change his name,’ I said. ‘If he becomes a priest he’s not worthy to be called Uhtred.’

‘You’re so like your father,’ he said, which surprised me because I had been frightened of my father. ‘And Uhtred is so like you!’ Beocca went on. ‘He looks like you, and he has your stubbornness,’ he chuckled, ‘you were a most stubborn child.’

I am often accused of being Uhtredærwe, the wicked enemy of Christianity, yet so many I have loved and admired have been Christians, and Beocca was chief among them. Beocca and his wife, Thyra, Hild, Æthelflaed, dear Father Pyrlig, Osferth, Willibald, even Alfred, the list is endless, and I suppose they were all good people because their religion insists they must behave in a certain way, which mine does not. Thor and Woden demand nothing of me except respect and some sacrifice, but they would never be so foolish as to insist that I love my enemy or turn the other cheek. Yet the best Christians, like Beocca, struggle daily to be good. I have never tried to be good, though nor do I think I am wicked. I am just me, Uhtred of Bebbanburg. ‘Uhtred,’ I said to Beocca, talking of my eldest son, ‘will be Lord of Bebbanburg after me. He can’t hold that fortress by prayer. He needs to learn how to fight.’