The Last Kingdom Series Books 1-6

‘You are Uhtred of Oxton?’ he asked.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I am the Lord Uhtred of Bebbanburg.’

‘Yes, lord.’

‘Sometimes known as Uhtredærwe,’ I added mischievously. Uhtred the Wicked.

‘Yes, lord,’ the priest said again and hurried away.

The bishop was called Alewold and he was really the bishop of Cridianton, but that place had not been thought as safe as Exanceaster and so for years the bishops of Cridianton had lived in the larger town which, as Guthrum had shown, was not the wisest decision. Guthrum’s Danes had pillaged the cathedral and the bishop’s house, which was still scantily furnished and I discovered Alewold sitting behind a table that looked as if it had once belonged to a butcher, for its hefty top was scored with knife cuts and stained with old blood. He looked at me indignantly. ‘You should not be here,’ he said.

‘Why not?’

‘You have business before the court tomorrow.’

‘Tomorrow,’ I said, ‘you sit as a judge. Today you are a bishop.’

He acknowledged that with a small nod. He was an elderly man with a heavy jowled face and a reputation as a severe judge. He had been with Alfred in Scireburnan when the Danes arrived in Exanceaster, which is why he was still alive, and, like all the bishops in Wessex, he was a fervent supporter of the king, and I had no doubt that Alfred’s dislike of me was known to Alewold, which meant I could expect little clemency when the court sat.

‘I am busy,’ Alewold said, gesturing at the parchments on the stained table. Two clerks shared the table and a half-dozen resentful priests had gathered behind the bishop’s chair.

‘My wife,’ I said, ‘inherited a debt to the church.’

Alewold looked at Iseult who alone had come into the house with me. She looked beautiful, proud and wealthy. There was silver at her throat and in her hair, and her cloak was fastened with two brooches, one of jet and the other of amber. ‘Your wife?’ the bishop asked snidely.

‘I would discharge the debt,’ I said, ignoring his question, and I tipped a bag onto his butcher’s table and the big silver plate we had taken from Ivar slid out. The silver made a satisfying noise as it thumped down and suddenly, in that small dark room ill-lit by three rush lights and a small, wood-barred window, it seemed as if the sun had come out. The heavy silver glowed and Alewold just stared at it.

There are good priests. Beocca is one and Willibald another, but I have discovered in my long life that most churchmen preach the merits of poverty while they lust after wealth. They love money and the church attracts money like a candle brings moths. I knew Alewold was a greedy man, as greedy for wealth as he was for the delights of a red-haired whore in Cippanhamm, and he could not take his eyes from that plate. He reached out and caressed the thick rim as if he scarce believed what he was seeing, and then he pulled the plate towards him and examined the twelve apostles. ‘A pyx,’ he said reverently.

‘A plate,’ I said casually.

One of the other priests leaned over a clerk’s shoulder. ‘Irish work,’ he said.

‘It looks Irish,’ Alewold agreed, then looked suspiciously at me. ‘You are returning it to the church?’

‘Returning it?’ I asked innocently.

‘The plate was plainly stolen,’ Alewold said, ‘and you do well, Uhtred, to bring it back.’

‘I had the plate made for you,’ I said.

He turned the plate over, which took some effort for it was heavy, and once it was inverted he pointed to the scratches in the silver. ‘It is old,’ he said.

‘I had it made in Ireland,’ I said grandly, ‘and doubtless it was handled roughly by the men who brought it across the sea.’

He knew I was lying. I did not care. ‘There are silversmiths in Wessex who could have made you a pyx,’ one of the priests snapped.

‘I thought you might want it,’ I said, then leaned forward and pulled the plate out of the bishop’s hands, ‘but if you prefer West Saxon work,’ I went on, ‘then I can …’

‘Give it back!’ Alewold said and, when I made no move to obey, his voice became pleading. ‘It is a beautiful thing.’ He could see it in his church, or perhaps in his hall, and he wanted it. There was silence as he stared at it. If he had known that the plate existed, if I had told Mildrith of it, then he would have had a response ready, but as it was he was overwhelmed by desire for the heavy silver. A maid brought in a flagon and he waved her out of the room. She was, I noted, red-haired. ‘You had the plate made,’ Alewold said sceptically.

‘In Dyflin,’ I said.

‘Is that where you went in the king’s ship?’ the priest who had snapped at me asked.

‘We patrolled the coast,’ I said, ‘nothing more.’

‘The value of the plate,’ Alewold began, then stopped.

‘Is far and above the debt Mildrith inherited,’ I said. That was probably not true, but it was close to the amount, and I could see Alewold did not care. I was going to get what I wanted.

The debt was discharged. I insisted on having that written down, and written three times, and I surprised them by being able to read and so discovering that the first scrap of parchment made no mention of the church yielding their rights to the future produce of my estate, but that was corrected and I let the bishop keep one copy while I took two. ‘You will not be arraigned for debt,’ the bishop said as he pressed his seal into the wax of the last copy, ‘but there is still the matter of Oswald’s wergild.’

‘I rely on your good and wise judgment, bishop,’ I said, and I opened the purse hanging at my waist and took out a small lump of gold, making sure he could see there was more gold inside as I placed the small lump on the plate. ‘Oswald was a thief.’

‘His family will make oaths that he was not,’ the priest said.

‘And I will bring men who will swear he was,’ I said. A trial relied heavily on oaths, but both sides would bring as many liars as they could muster, and judgment usually went to the better liars or, if both sides were equally convincing, to the side who had the sympathy of the onlookers. It was better, though, to have the sympathy of the judge. Oswald’s family would have many supporters around Exanceaster, but gold is much the best argument in a law court.

And so it proved. To Mildrith’s astonishment the debt was paid and Oswald’s family denied two hundred shillings of wergild. I did not even bother to go to the court, relying on the persuasive power of gold, and sure enough the bishop peremptorily dismissed the demand for wergild, saying it was well known that Oswald had been a thief, and so I won. That did not make me any more popular. To the folk who lived in the Uisc’s valley I was a Northumbrian interloper and, worse, it was known I was a pagan, but none dared confront me for I went nowhere beyond the estate without my men and my men went nowhere without their swords.

The harvest was in the storehouses. Now was the time for the Danes to come, when they could be sure to find food for their armies, but neither Guthrum nor Svein crossed the frontier. The winter came instead and we slaughtered the livestock, salted the meat, scraped hides and made calves’ foot jelly. I listened for the sound of church bells ringing at an unusual time, for that would have been a sign that the Danes had attacked, but the bells did not ring.

Mildrith prayed that the peace would continue and I, being young and bored, prayed it would not. She prayed to the Christian god and I took Iseult to the high woods and made a sacrifice to Hoder, Odin and Thor and the gods were listening, for in the dark beneath the gallows tree, where the three spinners make our lives, a red thread was woven into my life. Fate is everything, and just after Yule the spinners brought a royal messenger to Oxton and he, in turn, brought me a summons. It seemed possible that Iseult’s dream was true, and that Alfred would give me power for I was ordered to Cippanhamm to see the king. I was summoned to the Witan.

Five (#ulink_7069dbb2-1ad3-5606-9bb3-4f9e3717cbf9)

Mildrith was excited by the summons. The Witan gave the king advice and her father had never been wealthy or important enough to receive such a summons, and she was overjoyed that the king wanted my presence. The witanegemot, as the meeting was called, was always held on the Feast of St Stephen, the day after Christmas, but my summons required me to be there on the twelfth day of Christmas and that gave Mildrith time to wash clothes for me. They had to be boiled and scrubbed and dried and brushed, and three women did the work and it took three days before Mildrith was satisfied that I would not disgrace her by appearing at Cippanhamm looking like a vagabond. She was not summoned, nor did she expect to accompany me, but she made a point of telling all our neighbours that I was to give counsel to the king. ‘You mustn’t wear that,’ she told me, pointing to my Thor’s hammer amulet.

‘I always wear it,’ I said.

‘Then hide it,’ she said, ‘and don’t be belligerent!’

‘Belligerent?’

‘Listen to what others say,’ she said. ‘Be humble. And remember to congratulate Odda the Younger.’

‘For what?’

‘He’s to be married. Tell him I pray for them both.’ She was happy again, sure that by paying the church its debt I had regained Alfred’s favour and her good mood was not even spoilt when I announced I would take Iseult with me. She bridled slightly at the news, then said that it was only right that Iseult should be taken to Alfred. ‘If she is a queen,’ Mildrith said, ‘then she belongs in Alfred’s court. This isn’t a fit place for her.’ She insisted on taking silver coins to the church in Exanceaster where she donated the money to the poor and gave thanks that I had been restored to Alfred’s favour. She also thanked God for the good health of our son, Uhtred. I saw little of him, for he was still a baby and I have never had much patience for babies, but the women of Oxton constantly assured me that he was a lusty, strong boy.

We allowed two days for the journey. I took Haesten and six men as an escort for, though the shire-reeve’s men patrolled the roads, there were plenty of wild places where outlaws preyed on travellers. We were in mail coats or leather tunics, with swords, spears, axes and shields. We all rode. Iseult had a small black mare I had bought for her, and I had also given her an otterskin cloak, and when we passed through villages, folk would stare at her for she rode like a man, her black hair bound up with a silver chain. They would kneel to her, as well as to me, and call out for alms. She did not take her maid for I remembered how crowded every tavern and house had been in Exanceaster when the Witan met, and I persuaded Iseult that we would be hard-pressed to find accommodation for ourselves, let alone a maid.

‘What does the king want of you?’ she asked as we rode up the Uisc valley. Rainwater puddled in the long furrows, gleaming in the winter sunshine, while the woods were glossy with holly leaves and bright with the berries of rowan, thorn, elder and yew.

‘Aren’t you supposed to tell me that?’ I asked her.

She smiled. ‘Seeing the future,’ she said, ‘is like travelling a strange road. Usually you cannot see far ahead, and when you can it is only a glimpse. And my brother doesn’t give me dreams about everything.’