Enemies of the crown, p.6
Enemies of the Crown, page 6
‘Ah.’ Pallig sensed the frustration and returned to his ale.
Beornoth left Winchester the following morning. There would be no thanks for the victory at Lundenwic, Beornoth knew well. Ælfthryth had seen to it that Robert de Warenne bathed in the king’s glory and that men believed the Norman had led the defence of Lundenwic. There could be no place for Beornoth in King Æthelred’s new court. The king had forgiven those he had once banished. He sought repentance and reform to atone for his brother’s murder and the land taken from the Church. All Æthelred had achieved was to restore his court to its feral, decaying state of old. Beornoth feared for Æthelred, he worried how the bishops and the poisonous Ælfthryth would weaken the kingdom and leave its coasts and rivers open and inviting to the ever-hungry Viking threat.
He reached home on a sun-drenched afternoon. Beornoth dismounted and walked Virtus slowly along the stream which babbled through reed-filled meadows until he reached the small hall he shared with Eawynn. To call it a hall was generous. It was more like a large wattle and daub cottage. Alfgar had granted Beornoth the land from his estates close to Mameceaster. It was a smallholding between an orchard and the stream, and Eawynn loved the place. He found her knelt in the garden, tending to her roses. The sun shone through her hair, making the grey gleam like polished silver, and Beornoth allowed himself a rare smile.
‘Can you spare a few morsels of food for an old soldier, my lady?’ Beornoth said.
Eawynn turned and laughed. She hitched up her long dress and ran to embrace him. ‘I was so worried,’ she said.
‘I missed you.’
‘Thank God you came back.’
Beornoth remembered Thorkell’s axe and the horrors of the defence of Lundenwic. Survival had been a close-run thing. ‘How have you been?’
‘Alfgar sent a man to check on me every few days. I have been fine. Are you hungry?’
‘Starving.’
‘I made bread this morning, and there’s a broth in the pot.’ She hooked her slender arm through his heavy one and led Beornoth towards their home. Bees hummed about the garden, and the smell of fresh flowers filled Beornoth’s senses with contentment. He loved Eawynn beyond words. She was everything to him, though they had been estranged for a long time during the dark days. A memory came to him of her running amongst wildflowers, young and beautiful, playing with their two golden-haired daughters. They had lost those daughters in a Viking raid, and Eawynn had suffered viciously at the raiders’ hands. Beornoth bent to kiss her hair, and his eye caught the lurid scar across her neck and face where the raiders had cut Eawynn’s throat and left her for dead.
‘Let’s eat out here,’ he said. ‘We can sit in the sun. I must tend to Virtus first. He needs brushing and some food.’
‘We can do it together. I don’t want to be apart again, Beo.’
Beornoth watched her as Eawynn brushed Virtus and whispered gently into the horse’s ear. Wrinkles creased her top lip and crow’s feet pinched her eyes. Her hair was iron grey and her hands wrinkled, but she was beautiful. Later that afternoon, they ate broth and warm bread and watched the late summer breeze in the orchard trees. Beornoth hoped Æthelred would forget him, that his new advisors would not recommend that the king call for his Dane-killer when trouble returned. The years were growing long for both Beornoth and Eawynn, and he wanted to spend what time remained at her side. He put his sword, shield, helmet, spear and seax in a wooden chest at the end of his bed, and wrapped his byrnie in an oily fleece. Beornoth hoped his days of battle were over, that it was time for him to be at peace. But deep down, he knew there would never be peace. Not as long as there were men in the world. Men always craved more. More land, silver, women and glory. He just hoped they would forget about him at his little home beside the orchard. A man can hope, but the sea-wolves rage and the dangerous men are ever restless for blood and war.
6
1002AD
‘Here you go, my love,’ Beornoth said. He knelt beside the grassy mound and winced at the pain in his knees. He carried a small bundle of cowslips and primroses in his gnarled fist, freshly cut from Eawynn’s garden. Beornoth had done his best to tend the flower beds, roses and vegetables in the two years since her death, but he was no gardener. He laid down the flowers and brushed the wooden cross which marked her resting place. Beornoth had carved the grave marker himself in the cold winter in which she had died from a wracking cough. Eawynn had died in her sleep, peacefully. Beornoth had awoken to find her cold and still, without pain, for which he was thankful.
A chill in the spring air blew cold against Beornoth’s neck, carrying with it the earthy smell of damp soil and new leaves from the orchard beside which he had buried his wife. A hawthorn tree beside her grave bloomed with pale white flowers. Beornoth stared at the branches swaying softly in the breeze. She had loved to sit beside that tree, so he had buried her there, close to her garden and the orchard where she had loved to walk. The song of robins and blackbirds lilted from beside the stream, tinged with melancholy like the ache in Beornoth’s chest.
It had been two years since she had died, but Beornoth still came to be with her every day. The path from his home to the mound was worn and free of grass. He would spend time each morning talking to her as if she might hear him, sharing the unimportant details of his day – of how Virtus had fed, what Beornoth cooked for his supper, news from Alfgar and the goings-on in Mameceaster. They were the things they would have talked about as they sat together on long, dark evenings. Now, Beornoth talked to the wind, hoping that somehow his words would reach her, carried on the gusts which rustled through the orchard, briars and river reeds. Theirs was a life of sorrow, but filled with a love strengthened by all that they had endured.
Beornoth stared at the mound. The emptiness within him was a hollow space where her smile used to make him warm, where the warmth of her touch once gave him a reason to live. She was with God, Beornoth was sure. Alfgar had brought a bishop, priests and mourners to mark Eawynn’s burial. The ealdorman came to call on Beornoth from time to time and always extended an invitation for Beo to live with him at Mameceaster. Beornoth had helped make Alfgar ealdorman and taught him to fight. When Alfgar’s father, the old Ealdorman Aethelhelm, had first asked Beornoth to take Alfgar under his wing, he had been a callow youth fresh from studying at the Church, his fingers stained by ink and his arms and shoulders unused to the weight and use of weapons. Alfgar was the second son of the old ealdorman, and a bastard. As was usually the case for most second sons, Aethelhelm had steered Alfgar into the Church, but he had failed at his studies, stating that he did not feel close enough to God to preach his word. The ealdorman reluctantly took Alfgar from the Church and gave him to Beornoth to turn into a warrior, which Alfgar struggled with at first, but he was now the veteran of many battles against the Vikings, and had been instrumental in the defeat of Olaf Tryggvason’s forces outside Folkestone nine years ago. Beornoth thought of Alfgar as a friend, and the offer was a kind one, but Beornoth was content to remain alone in his home by the orchard.
A flower fell and Beornoth reached to fix it. His hands, strong and calloused from years of battle, hefting shields, swords and spears, felt clumsy as he straightened the flowers beneath the grave marker. He had held Eawynn for hours on the morning of her death, just to be close to her for one last time. For years she had tended his wounds, cleaned his mail and given him the benefit of her sharp mind with advice and guidance. Her presence had been a salve to his warrior’s bluntness, a quiet, steady love that anchored him. Without her, the silence was a weight pressing down upon his broad shoulders, leaving him stooped, with an ache in his heart to match the ache in his bones.
Beornoth had thought he would die once Eawynn was gone. He was not afraid of it. He almost welcomed it. His massive body was criss-crossed with scars, his beard as grey as an old helmet. He had come close to death so many times on the battlefield, and he dreamed of dying in that quiet place, in the home they had shared. Beornoth hoped he would join Eawynn in heaven. He prayed to God for that each day before sleep. A priest in Mameceaster had washed Beornoth free of sin and had assured him that the men he had killed would not bar his path to heaven. Beornoth was not so sure. He rose, old bones protesting, kissed his fingers and touched them to the wooden cross. He trudged through the wild grass toward his sparse home, but he would return tomorrow with more flowers, more words, and a dream that perhaps Eawynn could hear him from beyond the veil.
A horse whickered from the direction of Beornoth’s home, and it was not the sound of his warhorse. Virtus rested in a stable twenty paces from the house, and he knew her sounds as well as he knew his own voice. Beornoth straightened, forcing his shoulders back. He quickened his pace and was surprised to see a young warrior in a green cloak waiting on his wooden porch.
‘Lord Beornoth,’ the man said, rushing to his feet, face reddening.
‘Who are you?’ Beornoth asked. ‘Calm yourself, lad.’
‘Thank you, lord. Sorry, lord.’ The warrior fussed at his jerkin and straightened his cloak. ‘Ealdorman Alfgar requests you join him at Mameceaster.’
‘Why?’
‘There are men there, lord. For you. From the king.’
‘Is it war?’ Æthelred had not sent for Beornoth since Lundenwic eight summers ago. There had been war since, endless war. Viking attacks had been relentless in that time, and the people of England had suffered. Beornoth simply assumed that the king had no more need for him, that he had been put out to pasture like an old nag. Beornoth had accepted that fate. He had no hunger for more violence.
‘I’m just a warrior, lord. They don’t tell me why. I just follow orders.’
‘Are the men who came to Alfgar carrying weapons? Wearing armour?’
‘Yes, lord.’
‘How many?’
‘A score of them.’
‘Wait here.’
Beornoth went to the chest at the end of his bed and wiped the dust from its lid. He opened it and took out his weapons and armour. Beornoth pulled on his chain-mail byrnie, kept clean of rust by its oily fleece. He strapped on his thick leather belt and slid the sword into a scabbard bearing the king’s dragon. Beornoth eased the seax into its sheath and went to ready Virtus for the ride. He placed his leaf-shaped aesc spearhead in a saddlebag along with his helmet. The byrnie was tighter around the gut than it had been eight years ago, and Beornoth feared he looked like a grandfather in a younger man’s war gear. But he could not refuse a summons from the king.
After the short ride from Beornoth’s home to Mameceaster, Beornoth met Alfgar in his feasting hall. The ealdorman smiled and pulled Beornoth into a warm embrace. A steward brought bread and ale and placed them on a feasting bench beside the hearth fire.
‘Thank you for coming,’ said Alfgar. ‘I asked them not to bother you, but the king’s man insisted.’
‘You look tired,’ Beornoth replied, and regretted his bluntness as soon as the words escaped his lips. ‘I mean, you have grown more dignified since last we met.’ Alfgar’s beard showed white at his chin and his hair was thin on top.
‘Time waits for no man, Beo. Except you perhaps. I know men your age without a tooth in their head. You have the strength of a man half your age.’
‘No need for kind words between old friends. How are the children?’
‘They are children no longer. They ride and learn to fight, they disobey their mother and flee from their Latin instructor. You have not visited this year. How have you been?’
Beornoth thought about that for a moment. ‘Quiet. Resting.’
‘I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again to make sure that you understand. You are always welcome here, and nothing would make me happier than if you came to live with us. You could help train the young warriors, pass on your experience. It must be lonely out there on your own.’
‘I am not alone, and never lonely.’ Beornoth smiled. He was with Eawynn, and the memories of his life lived with him. Good and bad. He could awake to hear his daughters’ laughter, or sleep through dreams filled with the faces of men he had killed in battle. The faces of his past haunted him. ‘The king sends men here to speak to me?’
‘Yes. I am afraid so, Beo.’
‘The Vikings have returned?’
‘They have never left. Which seems to be the problem. You know the man who has come, I believe.’
‘There he is!’ called a voice from the hall door. A heavily accented voice. A Norman voice. ‘Lord Beornoth, scourge of the Danes.’ Robert de Warenne strode into Alfgar’s hall like he was the ealdorman of Cheshire. He walked with an easy swagger, tall, broad-shouldered and a thick silver chain about his neck. He wore a finely woven blue cloak tossed back over one shoulder to reveal a tunic embroidered with a double-headed axe.
Alfgar rose and Beornoth followed. ‘Lord Robert comes from Winchester with a message from the king,’ said Alfgar.
‘Lord, is it?’ said Beornoth. ‘The years have been kind to you.’
‘I am a king’s thegn now,’ said Robert de Warenne in a voice both silky and confident. ‘Just like you. Only the king himself is my superior.’ He glanced pointedly at Alfgar, as if the ealdorman wasn’t aware what it meant to hold the powerful office of king’s thegn.
‘Lord Robert is modest, Beo. He is also lord commander of Lundenwic and its environs, and commander of the king’s royal guard.’
‘You have come far for the son of a man exiled for murdering King Edward. How is the Lady Ælfthryth?’
Robert de Warenne smiled at the barb. ‘You must not have heard. The kingdom wept as one, for she died a year past. The king was distraught.’
‘I had not heard,’ said Alfgar. ‘Please pass on my deepest sympathies to the king.’
‘I will. She was a noble and remarkable woman, a great queen.’ Robert de Warenne stared at Beornoth. He met the Norman’s gaze but offered no sympathies. She was a murderer, a manipulator, and Beornoth was not sorry that Ælfthryth was dead. Robert de Warenne would love nothing more than for Beornoth to express his feelings for the late queen mother openly, so that he could scuttle back to Winchester and inform the king and condemn Beornoth to death.
‘There must have been many a mass said in the lady’s honour?’ said Alfgar.
‘A full week of prayer. And then a royal wedding.’
‘The king has a new wife?’
‘He does, and we should all rejoice. It is regretful that the king could not invite his northern ealdormen to grieve at his side, but we find ourselves in dark days, my lords.’
‘How has that news not reached the north? A new queen. We should feast and pray in celebration!’
‘It was one of the last great deeds of Lady Ælfthryth. Faced with treachery, and assaults on the kingdom from men who enjoyed the king’s trust, the marriage is truly groundbreaking. A union of necessity, promise and alliance. I played a small part in the bridal negotiations.’ Robert de Warenne waved a hand dismissively, as though the part he had actually played was nothing at all. Beornoth shifted uncomfortably. If Ælfthryth and de Warenne were involved, Beornoth expected a sting in the tail.
‘Please tell us, Lord Robert, who is the new queen? Of what noble family is she?’
‘She is Emma of Normandy, daughter of Richard the Fearless, count of Rouen.’
‘A Norman wife?’ Alfgar gasped and then turned his lips in on themselves as though to stop any further ill-advised comments escaping from his mouth.
‘Richard the Fearless,’ said Beornoth. ‘Or Jarl Rikard, son of William Longsword, as he is known to his Norse kin.’
‘That’s the chap. A relative of mine on my mother’s side,’ said Robert de Warenne.
‘Jarl Rikard, who offered shelter and succour to both Sweyn Forkbeard and Olaf Tryggvason the last time they invaded England.’
‘A regrettable incident, and one which is remedied by this happy union. No longer will Danes find a safe port to our east. We have allies in Normandy now. Kinsmen. It was not an easy marriage to broker, but a wise and cunning move. I am sure you will both agree. The count of Rouen prefers to be called Richard, not Rikard.’
‘I’m sure he does,’ Beornoth snapped. ‘I imagine the king rewarded you handsomely for finding his new wife?’
‘I have been lucky, I must admit. But we must talk about more pressing matters. There is a reason the king did not invite his northern ealdormen to the wedding celebration.’
‘Please, Lord Robert,’ said Alfgar, ‘share it with us. I have always served the king well and am surprised to have fallen out of favour.’
‘You are not out of favour, Lord Alfgar, rest assured of that. The king’s advisors thought it prudent that we keep the invites for those lords south of the Danelaw. There has been trouble, my lords, dark deeds, oaths broken, and the kingdom ravaged.’
A shiver passed across Beornoth’s shoulders as Robert de Warenne fixed him with a steely stare. ‘Danes?’ Beornoth asked.
‘Yes. A most heinous act, an attack from within. Danes sworn to the king’s service and honoured by him with silver, grants of land, titles and wealth turned against the kingdom and raided Sussex and Defnascir. They invited Vikings from across the sea to join them and laid waste to those shires. These were trusted men. One of them is a friend of yours, Beornoth.’
‘Who?’ Beornoth realised his hands had curled into fists and he forced himself to relax. His first thought was that his old friend and brother of the sword Brand Thorkilsson was involved. Brand was a Norseman who had fought beside Beornoth countless times. He had saved Beornoth’s life after Maldon and was now a landed thegn in the service of Ealdorman Thered of Northumbria.
‘Pallig Tokeson, or Pallig the Traitor, as he is now more widely known. He invited his kinsman, Kvitsr War Raven, with a score of ships to his treacherous enterprise. You remember Pallig, Lord Beornoth?’
‘I remember him.’
‘You and he were friends, as thick as thieves as I remember it.’
‘He fought well at Lundenwic, so did you and your brother. That does not make him, or you, my friend.’
Beornoth left Winchester the following morning. There would be no thanks for the victory at Lundenwic, Beornoth knew well. Ælfthryth had seen to it that Robert de Warenne bathed in the king’s glory and that men believed the Norman had led the defence of Lundenwic. There could be no place for Beornoth in King Æthelred’s new court. The king had forgiven those he had once banished. He sought repentance and reform to atone for his brother’s murder and the land taken from the Church. All Æthelred had achieved was to restore his court to its feral, decaying state of old. Beornoth feared for Æthelred, he worried how the bishops and the poisonous Ælfthryth would weaken the kingdom and leave its coasts and rivers open and inviting to the ever-hungry Viking threat.
He reached home on a sun-drenched afternoon. Beornoth dismounted and walked Virtus slowly along the stream which babbled through reed-filled meadows until he reached the small hall he shared with Eawynn. To call it a hall was generous. It was more like a large wattle and daub cottage. Alfgar had granted Beornoth the land from his estates close to Mameceaster. It was a smallholding between an orchard and the stream, and Eawynn loved the place. He found her knelt in the garden, tending to her roses. The sun shone through her hair, making the grey gleam like polished silver, and Beornoth allowed himself a rare smile.
‘Can you spare a few morsels of food for an old soldier, my lady?’ Beornoth said.
Eawynn turned and laughed. She hitched up her long dress and ran to embrace him. ‘I was so worried,’ she said.
‘I missed you.’
‘Thank God you came back.’
Beornoth remembered Thorkell’s axe and the horrors of the defence of Lundenwic. Survival had been a close-run thing. ‘How have you been?’
‘Alfgar sent a man to check on me every few days. I have been fine. Are you hungry?’
‘Starving.’
‘I made bread this morning, and there’s a broth in the pot.’ She hooked her slender arm through his heavy one and led Beornoth towards their home. Bees hummed about the garden, and the smell of fresh flowers filled Beornoth’s senses with contentment. He loved Eawynn beyond words. She was everything to him, though they had been estranged for a long time during the dark days. A memory came to him of her running amongst wildflowers, young and beautiful, playing with their two golden-haired daughters. They had lost those daughters in a Viking raid, and Eawynn had suffered viciously at the raiders’ hands. Beornoth bent to kiss her hair, and his eye caught the lurid scar across her neck and face where the raiders had cut Eawynn’s throat and left her for dead.
‘Let’s eat out here,’ he said. ‘We can sit in the sun. I must tend to Virtus first. He needs brushing and some food.’
‘We can do it together. I don’t want to be apart again, Beo.’
Beornoth watched her as Eawynn brushed Virtus and whispered gently into the horse’s ear. Wrinkles creased her top lip and crow’s feet pinched her eyes. Her hair was iron grey and her hands wrinkled, but she was beautiful. Later that afternoon, they ate broth and warm bread and watched the late summer breeze in the orchard trees. Beornoth hoped Æthelred would forget him, that his new advisors would not recommend that the king call for his Dane-killer when trouble returned. The years were growing long for both Beornoth and Eawynn, and he wanted to spend what time remained at her side. He put his sword, shield, helmet, spear and seax in a wooden chest at the end of his bed, and wrapped his byrnie in an oily fleece. Beornoth hoped his days of battle were over, that it was time for him to be at peace. But deep down, he knew there would never be peace. Not as long as there were men in the world. Men always craved more. More land, silver, women and glory. He just hoped they would forget about him at his little home beside the orchard. A man can hope, but the sea-wolves rage and the dangerous men are ever restless for blood and war.
6
1002AD
‘Here you go, my love,’ Beornoth said. He knelt beside the grassy mound and winced at the pain in his knees. He carried a small bundle of cowslips and primroses in his gnarled fist, freshly cut from Eawynn’s garden. Beornoth had done his best to tend the flower beds, roses and vegetables in the two years since her death, but he was no gardener. He laid down the flowers and brushed the wooden cross which marked her resting place. Beornoth had carved the grave marker himself in the cold winter in which she had died from a wracking cough. Eawynn had died in her sleep, peacefully. Beornoth had awoken to find her cold and still, without pain, for which he was thankful.
A chill in the spring air blew cold against Beornoth’s neck, carrying with it the earthy smell of damp soil and new leaves from the orchard beside which he had buried his wife. A hawthorn tree beside her grave bloomed with pale white flowers. Beornoth stared at the branches swaying softly in the breeze. She had loved to sit beside that tree, so he had buried her there, close to her garden and the orchard where she had loved to walk. The song of robins and blackbirds lilted from beside the stream, tinged with melancholy like the ache in Beornoth’s chest.
It had been two years since she had died, but Beornoth still came to be with her every day. The path from his home to the mound was worn and free of grass. He would spend time each morning talking to her as if she might hear him, sharing the unimportant details of his day – of how Virtus had fed, what Beornoth cooked for his supper, news from Alfgar and the goings-on in Mameceaster. They were the things they would have talked about as they sat together on long, dark evenings. Now, Beornoth talked to the wind, hoping that somehow his words would reach her, carried on the gusts which rustled through the orchard, briars and river reeds. Theirs was a life of sorrow, but filled with a love strengthened by all that they had endured.
Beornoth stared at the mound. The emptiness within him was a hollow space where her smile used to make him warm, where the warmth of her touch once gave him a reason to live. She was with God, Beornoth was sure. Alfgar had brought a bishop, priests and mourners to mark Eawynn’s burial. The ealdorman came to call on Beornoth from time to time and always extended an invitation for Beo to live with him at Mameceaster. Beornoth had helped make Alfgar ealdorman and taught him to fight. When Alfgar’s father, the old Ealdorman Aethelhelm, had first asked Beornoth to take Alfgar under his wing, he had been a callow youth fresh from studying at the Church, his fingers stained by ink and his arms and shoulders unused to the weight and use of weapons. Alfgar was the second son of the old ealdorman, and a bastard. As was usually the case for most second sons, Aethelhelm had steered Alfgar into the Church, but he had failed at his studies, stating that he did not feel close enough to God to preach his word. The ealdorman reluctantly took Alfgar from the Church and gave him to Beornoth to turn into a warrior, which Alfgar struggled with at first, but he was now the veteran of many battles against the Vikings, and had been instrumental in the defeat of Olaf Tryggvason’s forces outside Folkestone nine years ago. Beornoth thought of Alfgar as a friend, and the offer was a kind one, but Beornoth was content to remain alone in his home by the orchard.
A flower fell and Beornoth reached to fix it. His hands, strong and calloused from years of battle, hefting shields, swords and spears, felt clumsy as he straightened the flowers beneath the grave marker. He had held Eawynn for hours on the morning of her death, just to be close to her for one last time. For years she had tended his wounds, cleaned his mail and given him the benefit of her sharp mind with advice and guidance. Her presence had been a salve to his warrior’s bluntness, a quiet, steady love that anchored him. Without her, the silence was a weight pressing down upon his broad shoulders, leaving him stooped, with an ache in his heart to match the ache in his bones.
Beornoth had thought he would die once Eawynn was gone. He was not afraid of it. He almost welcomed it. His massive body was criss-crossed with scars, his beard as grey as an old helmet. He had come close to death so many times on the battlefield, and he dreamed of dying in that quiet place, in the home they had shared. Beornoth hoped he would join Eawynn in heaven. He prayed to God for that each day before sleep. A priest in Mameceaster had washed Beornoth free of sin and had assured him that the men he had killed would not bar his path to heaven. Beornoth was not so sure. He rose, old bones protesting, kissed his fingers and touched them to the wooden cross. He trudged through the wild grass toward his sparse home, but he would return tomorrow with more flowers, more words, and a dream that perhaps Eawynn could hear him from beyond the veil.
A horse whickered from the direction of Beornoth’s home, and it was not the sound of his warhorse. Virtus rested in a stable twenty paces from the house, and he knew her sounds as well as he knew his own voice. Beornoth straightened, forcing his shoulders back. He quickened his pace and was surprised to see a young warrior in a green cloak waiting on his wooden porch.
‘Lord Beornoth,’ the man said, rushing to his feet, face reddening.
‘Who are you?’ Beornoth asked. ‘Calm yourself, lad.’
‘Thank you, lord. Sorry, lord.’ The warrior fussed at his jerkin and straightened his cloak. ‘Ealdorman Alfgar requests you join him at Mameceaster.’
‘Why?’
‘There are men there, lord. For you. From the king.’
‘Is it war?’ Æthelred had not sent for Beornoth since Lundenwic eight summers ago. There had been war since, endless war. Viking attacks had been relentless in that time, and the people of England had suffered. Beornoth simply assumed that the king had no more need for him, that he had been put out to pasture like an old nag. Beornoth had accepted that fate. He had no hunger for more violence.
‘I’m just a warrior, lord. They don’t tell me why. I just follow orders.’
‘Are the men who came to Alfgar carrying weapons? Wearing armour?’
‘Yes, lord.’
‘How many?’
‘A score of them.’
‘Wait here.’
Beornoth went to the chest at the end of his bed and wiped the dust from its lid. He opened it and took out his weapons and armour. Beornoth pulled on his chain-mail byrnie, kept clean of rust by its oily fleece. He strapped on his thick leather belt and slid the sword into a scabbard bearing the king’s dragon. Beornoth eased the seax into its sheath and went to ready Virtus for the ride. He placed his leaf-shaped aesc spearhead in a saddlebag along with his helmet. The byrnie was tighter around the gut than it had been eight years ago, and Beornoth feared he looked like a grandfather in a younger man’s war gear. But he could not refuse a summons from the king.
After the short ride from Beornoth’s home to Mameceaster, Beornoth met Alfgar in his feasting hall. The ealdorman smiled and pulled Beornoth into a warm embrace. A steward brought bread and ale and placed them on a feasting bench beside the hearth fire.
‘Thank you for coming,’ said Alfgar. ‘I asked them not to bother you, but the king’s man insisted.’
‘You look tired,’ Beornoth replied, and regretted his bluntness as soon as the words escaped his lips. ‘I mean, you have grown more dignified since last we met.’ Alfgar’s beard showed white at his chin and his hair was thin on top.
‘Time waits for no man, Beo. Except you perhaps. I know men your age without a tooth in their head. You have the strength of a man half your age.’
‘No need for kind words between old friends. How are the children?’
‘They are children no longer. They ride and learn to fight, they disobey their mother and flee from their Latin instructor. You have not visited this year. How have you been?’
Beornoth thought about that for a moment. ‘Quiet. Resting.’
‘I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again to make sure that you understand. You are always welcome here, and nothing would make me happier than if you came to live with us. You could help train the young warriors, pass on your experience. It must be lonely out there on your own.’
‘I am not alone, and never lonely.’ Beornoth smiled. He was with Eawynn, and the memories of his life lived with him. Good and bad. He could awake to hear his daughters’ laughter, or sleep through dreams filled with the faces of men he had killed in battle. The faces of his past haunted him. ‘The king sends men here to speak to me?’
‘Yes. I am afraid so, Beo.’
‘The Vikings have returned?’
‘They have never left. Which seems to be the problem. You know the man who has come, I believe.’
‘There he is!’ called a voice from the hall door. A heavily accented voice. A Norman voice. ‘Lord Beornoth, scourge of the Danes.’ Robert de Warenne strode into Alfgar’s hall like he was the ealdorman of Cheshire. He walked with an easy swagger, tall, broad-shouldered and a thick silver chain about his neck. He wore a finely woven blue cloak tossed back over one shoulder to reveal a tunic embroidered with a double-headed axe.
Alfgar rose and Beornoth followed. ‘Lord Robert comes from Winchester with a message from the king,’ said Alfgar.
‘Lord, is it?’ said Beornoth. ‘The years have been kind to you.’
‘I am a king’s thegn now,’ said Robert de Warenne in a voice both silky and confident. ‘Just like you. Only the king himself is my superior.’ He glanced pointedly at Alfgar, as if the ealdorman wasn’t aware what it meant to hold the powerful office of king’s thegn.
‘Lord Robert is modest, Beo. He is also lord commander of Lundenwic and its environs, and commander of the king’s royal guard.’
‘You have come far for the son of a man exiled for murdering King Edward. How is the Lady Ælfthryth?’
Robert de Warenne smiled at the barb. ‘You must not have heard. The kingdom wept as one, for she died a year past. The king was distraught.’
‘I had not heard,’ said Alfgar. ‘Please pass on my deepest sympathies to the king.’
‘I will. She was a noble and remarkable woman, a great queen.’ Robert de Warenne stared at Beornoth. He met the Norman’s gaze but offered no sympathies. She was a murderer, a manipulator, and Beornoth was not sorry that Ælfthryth was dead. Robert de Warenne would love nothing more than for Beornoth to express his feelings for the late queen mother openly, so that he could scuttle back to Winchester and inform the king and condemn Beornoth to death.
‘There must have been many a mass said in the lady’s honour?’ said Alfgar.
‘A full week of prayer. And then a royal wedding.’
‘The king has a new wife?’
‘He does, and we should all rejoice. It is regretful that the king could not invite his northern ealdormen to grieve at his side, but we find ourselves in dark days, my lords.’
‘How has that news not reached the north? A new queen. We should feast and pray in celebration!’
‘It was one of the last great deeds of Lady Ælfthryth. Faced with treachery, and assaults on the kingdom from men who enjoyed the king’s trust, the marriage is truly groundbreaking. A union of necessity, promise and alliance. I played a small part in the bridal negotiations.’ Robert de Warenne waved a hand dismissively, as though the part he had actually played was nothing at all. Beornoth shifted uncomfortably. If Ælfthryth and de Warenne were involved, Beornoth expected a sting in the tail.
‘Please tell us, Lord Robert, who is the new queen? Of what noble family is she?’
‘She is Emma of Normandy, daughter of Richard the Fearless, count of Rouen.’
‘A Norman wife?’ Alfgar gasped and then turned his lips in on themselves as though to stop any further ill-advised comments escaping from his mouth.
‘Richard the Fearless,’ said Beornoth. ‘Or Jarl Rikard, son of William Longsword, as he is known to his Norse kin.’
‘That’s the chap. A relative of mine on my mother’s side,’ said Robert de Warenne.
‘Jarl Rikard, who offered shelter and succour to both Sweyn Forkbeard and Olaf Tryggvason the last time they invaded England.’
‘A regrettable incident, and one which is remedied by this happy union. No longer will Danes find a safe port to our east. We have allies in Normandy now. Kinsmen. It was not an easy marriage to broker, but a wise and cunning move. I am sure you will both agree. The count of Rouen prefers to be called Richard, not Rikard.’
‘I’m sure he does,’ Beornoth snapped. ‘I imagine the king rewarded you handsomely for finding his new wife?’
‘I have been lucky, I must admit. But we must talk about more pressing matters. There is a reason the king did not invite his northern ealdormen to the wedding celebration.’
‘Please, Lord Robert,’ said Alfgar, ‘share it with us. I have always served the king well and am surprised to have fallen out of favour.’
‘You are not out of favour, Lord Alfgar, rest assured of that. The king’s advisors thought it prudent that we keep the invites for those lords south of the Danelaw. There has been trouble, my lords, dark deeds, oaths broken, and the kingdom ravaged.’
A shiver passed across Beornoth’s shoulders as Robert de Warenne fixed him with a steely stare. ‘Danes?’ Beornoth asked.
‘Yes. A most heinous act, an attack from within. Danes sworn to the king’s service and honoured by him with silver, grants of land, titles and wealth turned against the kingdom and raided Sussex and Defnascir. They invited Vikings from across the sea to join them and laid waste to those shires. These were trusted men. One of them is a friend of yours, Beornoth.’
‘Who?’ Beornoth realised his hands had curled into fists and he forced himself to relax. His first thought was that his old friend and brother of the sword Brand Thorkilsson was involved. Brand was a Norseman who had fought beside Beornoth countless times. He had saved Beornoth’s life after Maldon and was now a landed thegn in the service of Ealdorman Thered of Northumbria.
‘Pallig Tokeson, or Pallig the Traitor, as he is now more widely known. He invited his kinsman, Kvitsr War Raven, with a score of ships to his treacherous enterprise. You remember Pallig, Lord Beornoth?’
‘I remember him.’
‘You and he were friends, as thick as thieves as I remember it.’
‘He fought well at Lundenwic, so did you and your brother. That does not make him, or you, my friend.’
