Hereward 02 - The Devil's Army (29 page)

Once he felt the intense bloom of the flames scorch his face, he hurled Aethelwold to his knees and held out one hand to Kraki. The Viking read the gesture and passed his axe to the Mercian. The monks began to sob, clasping their hands together and begging God for help. Hereward ignored their pleas. He forced the prior’s head down and raised the axe over his head.

Bodies littered the track in front of the gate, his own men and Normans together in one blood-soaked trail. He looked past them and through the swirling flames until he glimpsed the next rank of the king’s men approaching, shields held high against the heat. They slowed, then halted when they saw him.

‘You know me,’ he bellowed over the crackling of the conflagration. ‘You have your eyes and ears in Ely. You know why they call me the Devil and what I will do. Tell your master to lead his battle-wolves back into the trees or I will slaughter all the men of God in Burgh. And on his soul must it be.’

The Normans lowered their shields, unsure. Hereward shook the axe over his head. The king’s warriors hesitated for only a moment, seeing the cold conviction in their enemy’s face, and then they fled. The Mercian allowed himself a low laugh. The monks had fallen to their knees, wailing, and the trembling prior was muttering a prayer.

‘Rise, Father. You are not to die this day,’ the Mercian said. ‘In truth, you have been saved.’

Aethelwold looked up with burning eyes. He stood on shaking legs and stuttered, ‘You are mad.’

Hereward grinned. All eyes following him, he strode to the nearest corpse, one of the fallen Danes, pushing aside his unease at what he was about to do. ‘This fallen battle-wolf deserves better, but in death he will help save us, his brothers,’ he said, grasping the dead man’s hair and pulling the head back. With one clean sweep of the axe, he sliced through the neck. The monks cried out.

‘Here is the first of your men of God,’ Hereward bellowed. He whirled the head around by the hair and flung it over the wall of fire. It bounced across the ramparts where he knew the Normans would see it. ‘If they doubted me, they now know I am true to my word,’ he said to the other men, holding out his arms.

‘What use is this?’ Kraki demanded. ‘Even if they let us pass through the gates, they will still be upon our backs the moment we make for the boats. They will slaughter us on the banks of the river where we cannot defend ourselves.’

‘Then let them wait,’ Hereward replied. ‘And wait.’ He grabbed Aethelwold’s dalmatic tunic once more and began to drag him back up the track. ‘Come, Father, your prayers have been answered,’ he said in a sardonic tone.

When they reached the abbey grounds, he called his war-band to him, and the rest of the monks too. ‘We have bought ourselves time,’ he said, ‘and while the Normans wait for us to step out into the open, we will be on our way to Ely with our prizes.’ He saw his warriors glancing uneasily down the track to the fire and added, ‘We are not leaving the way we came. Follow me, but hold your tongues once we reach the wall.’

As the questions flew fast, he ran out of the minster again, and towards the eastern wall, dragging the prior along with him. ‘The Normans will be watching the river-gate,’ Aethelwold gasped.

‘True. Only a fool would leave that way.’

Hereward followed the wall north from the river-gate until he reached the north-eastern corner. Guthrinc waited there with a small group of Danes, his face flushed and his hands dirty. A small portion of the timber had been battered down. The Mercian nodded, pleased, and turned to the prior. ‘Leofwine the Tall has told me of your new abbot. Your days here in Burgh are soon to be grim.’

‘We have no say in the matter,’ Aethelwold snapped.

‘No, for any sour words from you would only bring the king’s wrath down upon your head. You must suffer any pain this Turold sends your way.’ He paused, grinning. ‘Unless you come with us.’

The prior eyed the Mercian askance, his eyes suspicious.

‘The Normans will think we have taken you prisoner and so you will be spared the king’s punishment,’ Hereward continued. ‘And you can spend your days in Ely, watching over the bones of your saints, until this war is won and you can return to Burgh.’

The prior’s eyes widened and for a moment he couldn’t speak. ‘It seems I have misjudged you.’

‘I am still the Devil, Father,’ Hereward replied with a wry smile, ‘but in an age of hardship you must take what help you can.’ He turned to Kraki and whispered, ‘When the time is right, lead our battle-wolves to the boats. Keep the monks apart from the treasure.’ The Viking grunted his understanding.

Drawing Brainbiter, the Mercian beckoned for Redwald, Guthrinc and four of the fiercest Danes to follow him through the gap in the wall. He prowled through the shadows along the palisade until he glimpsed the Normans caught in the moonlight by the smaller river-gate. There were five of them, and one more on horseback, ready to ride off and raise the alarm if the English tried to escape that way. Kneeling, Guthrinc nocked an arrow and drew his bow. He nodded to Hereward, understanding what was expected of him.

The shaft whipped through the air. As the mounted knight fell backwards, dead, the other warriors jumped to their feet. Their
cries were lost beneath the roar of the fire. Hereward ghosted forward. His blade whispered once and the nearest warrior fell. Before his foes could gather their wits, he rammed his sword up into the armpit of the next soldier. Like wolves, the Danes fell on the remaining three. Hereward watched the slaughter with satisfaction. The Normans had tried to trick them into a trap. They had given their best, and still they had lost.

Sheathing his blade, he watched his men and the monks flood out from the gap in the wall. Kraki waved them towards the boats. At the rear, men lumbered under the weight of the sacks of treasure and the relic chest.

Hereward raised one fist to the heavens in celebration. How long he had desired that victory, and how sweet it tasted. Yet it was only the start. More fighting lay ahead, more bloodshed. But now there could be no doubts that with the Danes beside them, and God on their side, the English could win back their land.

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY
-O
NE

THE SUN WAS
rising across the fenlands. Streaks of pink and purple flowed through sky and into glassy mere as the fleet of flat-bottomed boats drifted home. The exhausted army could have been alone in all the world. Only oars dipping with lazy strokes and hide hulls creaking against the currents disturbed the tranquil morning. Overhead, marsh harriers wheeled. In the prow of the lead vessel, Hereward shielded his eyes to watch the elegant birds of prey perform their intricate dance. For a while he flew with them.

Ely loomed up, twirls of grey smoke from the morning fires rising to the pale blue sky. He gazed back over his silent warriors and saw grins blossom whenever his eyes were met. He felt proud of his war-band. Not a single man had failed him.

‘What now?’ Redwald asked, looking up with an easy smile.

‘Rest. Fill our bellies. And let word of our victory spread.’

Redwald thought for a moment as he watched a dragonfly skimming across the dark water. ‘You believe we can win?’

‘Do you have doubts?’ Hereward asked, surprised.

The younger man flashed a grin. ‘No. No doubts.’

Once the boats had moored, the chattering crowd of warriors and monks milled along the mere’s edge. Weariness ebbed away
in a flood of euphoria at their great victory. Hereward led the troupe up the winding track to the dewy ramparts and through the gates into the just-waking community. The Danes flooded back to their camp where the rest of their brothers waited, shaking their axes in the air as they bellowed for mead.

Prior Aethelwold trudged up the slope towards the abbey. His beaming monks trailed close behind, whispering to each other with excitement. How bright they looked for men who had lost their home, Hereward noted. The threat of their new master must have haunted them indeed. He walked alongside the small knot of English warriors hauling the heavy sacks of treasure and the relic chest. While Aethelwold and the new arrivals were welcomed by Abbot Thurstan, Hereward ordered the men to hide their plunder beneath the floor of a hall next to the church. He nodded with satisfaction as he watched the relic being carried into the church. Folk would come from all around to marvel over it and seek God’s grace. And then the word would spread like a summer fire.

‘Keep guards upon the door of the treasure house at all hours,’ he murmured to Kraki. ‘There are men here who would kill for such riches.’

‘
I
would kill for such riches,’ the Viking grunted in reply.

As Kraki strode off to find fresh men to watch the hall, Alric hurried over from the gate. He clapped a hand on his friend’s arm. ‘William still sits on the throne? You have failed us all.’

‘I am leaving him for you, monk. You can talk him to death,’ the Mercian replied, grinning.

‘Hengist has already talked enough for both of us. The children dance around him as he weaves a tale of this last night that would not shame a scop. Your great victory has put fire back in his belly.’

‘Hengist is a good man who has suffered much. He has earned some peace.’ He nodded towards the church. ‘Go. Greet your new friends from Burgh. I would tell my wife I am well.’ As he made to go, he saw the monk frowning.

‘I cannot find Turfrida,’ Alric said. ‘I took her fresh bread at
dawn, as I do each day, but your home was empty, the hearth cold.’

Hereward shrugged. ‘She is in the camp, then, helping out the sick with her plants and pastes and foul drinks. Even though she is heavy with her own child, she will still help any who ask. Or,’ he laughed, ‘she is out in the woods, whispering to the trees and the birds and learning their secrets.’

Reassured, Alric hurried towards the church and Hereward strode to his house, his belly growling and his limbs aching for rest. But he found his home as empty as Alric had said, and he felt sad that for the first time in many a day his wife was not there to greet him. He ate some of the bread the monk had brought, and some cold stew, and he swigged back a cup of beer before sleeping soundly until the sun was at its highest. And still Turfrida was not there.

Curious now, he strode down to the Camp of Refuge. It was warm, and the narrow tracks among the makeshift houses were crowded with folk gossiping about the night’s raid. Men clapped him on the shoulder and young girls flirted as he moved among the throng. The children would not leave him alone. How he hated that. Everywhere he asked after Turfrida, but no one had seen her since the previous evening.

As the day drew on, he began to worry. Ely was brimming with life, but it was a small place and everyone knew his wife. Someone would have seen her if she were there. With the shadows lengthening, he forged out of the gates and searched the quiet glades and along the banks of streams where she hunted for her plants, or practised her mechanical arts. Alric strode down from the ramparts, then Guthrinc, and Redwald, and Kraki. They barely spoke. Every inch of the isle, they walked.

The sun set.

Through the long reaches of the night, Hereward waited by the hearth, staring into the flames, listening to every footstep that passed his door, every creak of the settling timber, every whisper of the breeze in the roof.

In the chill dawn, his panic began to mount but he tried to
push his fears aside. He ventured out to the walls. His friends were already waiting. They took the fen boats and rowed along the edge of the mere, pushing a long stick into the shallows.

On the next day, they rowed out into deeper water. News of their search had travelled across Ely, and the mood had darkened. People spoke once more of Dunnere’s daughter, who had not been seen since the English army settled in Ely. When he returned to snatch a bite of bread or fish, Hereward sensed eyes on him, but every man and woman looked away rather than meet his gaze.

Once night had fallen, Acha found him desperate and brooding on the mound, watching the stars reflected in the mere. She sat with him in silence for a long moment, and then said, ‘Doubt my words if you will, but I would never wish for this misery, nor would I see your heart ache so. I pray that she comes back to you.’ Her hand touched his, so briefly he barely realized it before she had slipped away into the dark. He heard the heartfelt emotion in her words and he was surprised how much it touched him.

Near sick with worry, he could not sleep, catching only fitful dozes in the church, nor could he bear to return to the home he had shared with his wife. He refused to believe her dead, but mounting grief crept up on him and settled into his heart like a stone. He tried to distract himself with plans for the coming war, but even they could not console him.

Early in the morning, desperate for any sign, he forced himself to go back to his cold dwelling and picked through Turfrida’s meagre possessions. Each item called forth a sharp memory. He felt an ache that he had not experienced since he looked down on the body of his mother, her blood draining into the boards of his father’s hall. But as his hand hovered over the old chest she had brought with her from Flanders, his senses prickled. Something was missing. He sifted through his memories, turning over the necklaces and charms with increasing desperation until a revelation struck him. The brooch her father had given her on their wedding day, her most precious possession – gone. Her
comb too. He reeled back, barely daring to believe. Rushing out into the pale light, he raced to Redwald’s home and dragged him from his bed.

‘Turfrida is not dead,’ he shouted with a defiant shake of his fist. ‘She took her brooch … her comb …’

Redwald wiped his bleary eyes with the back of his hand and looked up at his brother. ‘Do not raise your hopes,’ he began.

‘No,’ Hereward almost shouted. ‘I know her. If she were travelling those are the two things she would take with her.’

‘Where would she go? And why would she tell no one?’

‘I have no answer. But I will find one. Wake the others. We will meet at the abbot’s hall, and plan—’ He stopped speaking and cocked his head. Someone was shouting his name.