Sword of Kings

I rarely carried Serpent-Breath when I was inside Bebbanburg, but I had Wasp-Sting at my hip and now I drew the short-sword, turned her so that the hilt was towards Wistan, then slid the blade across the flagstones. ‘Your god says you must kill me. Why don’t you?’

‘Lord …’ he said, then had nothing more to say.

‘You told me you were sent to rid the world of my wickedness,’ I pointed out. ‘You know they call me Uhtredærwe?’

‘Yes, lord,’ he said, scarce above a whisper.

‘Uhtred the priest-killer?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, lord.’

‘I have killed priests,’ I said, ‘and monks.’

‘Not on purpose,’ Eadith put in.

‘Sometimes on purpose,’ I said, ‘but usually in anger.’ I shrugged. ‘Tell me what else you know about me.’

Wistan hesitated, then found his courage. ‘You are a pagan, lord, and a warlord. You are friends with the heathen, you encourage them!’ He hesitated again.

‘Go on,’ I said.

‘Men say you want Æthelstan to be king in Wessex because you have bewitched him. That you will use him to take the throne for yourself!’

‘Is that all?’ I asked, amused.

He had not been looking at me, but now raised his eyes to gaze into mine. ‘They say you killed Æthelhelm the Elder and that you forced his daughter to marry your son. That she was raped! Here, in your fortress.’ He had anger on his face and tears in his eyes and, for a heartbeat, I thought he would snatch up Wasp-Sting.

Then Eadith laughed. She said nothing, just laughed, and her apparent amusement puzzled Wistan. Eadith was looking quizzically at me, and I nodded. She knew what the nod meant and so went into the windswept night. The candles fluttered wildly as she opened and closed the door, but they stayed lit. They were the only illumination in the small chapel, so Wistan and I spoke in near darkness. ‘It’s a rare day when there’s no wind,’ I said mildly. ‘Wind and rain, rain and wind, Bebbanburg’s weather.’

He said nothing.

‘Tell me,’ I said, still sitting beside the chapel wall, ‘how did I kill Ealdorman Æthelhelm?’

‘How would I know, lord?’

‘How do men in Wessex say that he died?’ He did not answer. ‘You are from Wessex?’

‘Yes, lord,’ he muttered.

‘Then tell me what men in Wessex say about Ealdorman Æthelhelm’s death.’

‘They say he was poisoned, lord.’

I half smiled. ‘By a pagan sorcerer?’

He shrugged. ‘You would know, lord, not me.’

‘Then, Wistan of Wessex,’ I went on, ‘let me tell you what I do know. I did not kill Ealdorman Æthelhelm. He died of the fever despite all the care we gave him. He received the last rites of your church. His daughter was with him when he died, and she was neither raped nor forced into marriage with my son.’

He said nothing. The light of the big candles flickered their reflection from Wasp-Sting’s blade. The night wind rattled the chapel door and sighed about the roof. ‘Tell me what you know of Prince Æthelstan,’ I said.

‘That he is a bastard,’ Wistan said, ‘and would take the throne from Ælfweard.’

‘Ælfweard,’ I said, ‘who is nephew to the present Ealdorman Æthelhelm, and is King Edward’s second oldest son. Does Edward still live?’

‘Praise God, yes.’

‘And Ælfweard is his second son, yet you claim he should be king after his father.’

‘He is the ætheling, lord.’

‘The eldest son is the ætheling,’ I pointed out.

‘And in the eyes of God the king’s eldest son is Ælfweard,’ Wistan insisted, ‘because Æthelstan is a bastard.’

‘A bastard,’ I repeated.

‘Yes, lord,’ he said stubbornly.

‘Tomorrow,’ I said, ‘I’ll introduce you to Father Cuthbert. You’ll like him! I keep him safe in this fortress, do you know why?’ Wistan shook his head. ‘Because many years ago,’ I went on, ‘Father Cuthbert was foolish enough to marry the young Prince Edward to a pretty Centish girl, the daughter of a bishop. That girl died in childbirth, but she left twin children, Eadgyth and Æthelstan. I say Father Cuthbert was foolish because Edward did not have his father’s permission to marry, but nevertheless the marriage was consecrated by a Christian priest in a Christian church. And those who would deny Æthelstan his true inheritance have been trying to silence Father Cuthbert ever since. They would kill him, Wistan, so that the truth is never known, and that is why I keep him safe in this fortress.’

‘But …’ he began, and again he had nothing to say. For his whole life, which I guessed was about twenty years, he had been told by everyone in Wessex that Æthelstan was a bastard, and that Ælfweard was the true heir to Edward’s throne. He had believed that lie, he had believed that Æthelstan was whelped on a whore, and now I was destroying that belief. He believed me, and he did not want to believe me, and so he said nothing.

‘And you believe your god sent you to kill me?’ I asked.

He still said nothing. He just gazed at the sword that lay by his feet.

I laughed. ‘My wife is a Christian, my son is a Christian, my oldest and closest friend is a Christian, and over half my men are Christians. Wouldn’t your god have asked one of them to kill me instead of sending you? Why send you all the way from Wessex when there are a hundred or more Christians here who can strike me down?’ He neither moved nor spoke. ‘The fisherman you tortured and killed was also a Christian,’ I said.

He started at that and shook his head. ‘I tried to stop that, but Edgar …’

His voice tailed away to silence, but I had noted the very slight hesitation before the name Edgar. ‘Edgar isn’t his real name, is it?’ I asked. ‘Who is he?’

But the church door creaked open before he could answer, and Eadith led Ælswyth into the wind-fluttering candlelight. Ælswyth stopped as soon as she entered, she stared at Wistan, and then she smiled with delight.

Ælswyth is my daughter-in-law, the daughter of my enemy, and sister to his son, who hates me as much as his father did. Her father, Æthelhelm the Elder, planned to make her a queen, to exchange her beauty for some throne in Christendom, but my son gained her first and she had lived at Bebbanburg ever since. To look at her was to think that no girl so wan, so pale and thin could survive the harsh winters and brutal winds of Northumbria, let alone the agonies of childbirth, yet Ælswyth had given me two grandsons and she alone in the fortress seemed immune to the aches, sneezes, shivers, and coughs that marked our winter months. She looked frail, but was as strong as steel. Her face, so lovely, lit with joy when she saw Wistan. She had a smile that could melt the heart of a beast, but Wistan did not smile back, instead he just gaped at her as if shocked.

‘Æthelwulf!’ Eadith exclaimed and went towards him with open arms.

‘Æthelwulf!’ I repeated, amused. The name meant ‘noble wolf’ and the young man who had called himself Wistan might look noble, yet he looked anything but wolflike.

Æthelwulf blushed. He let Ælswyth embrace him, then looked at me sheepishly. ‘I am Æthelwulf,’ he admitted, and in a tone that suggested I should recognise the name.

‘My brother!’ Ælswyth said happily. ‘My youngest brother!’ It was then she saw Wasp-Sting on the stone floor and frowned, looking to me for an explanation.

‘Your brother,’ I said, ‘was sent to kill me.’

‘Kill you?’ Ælswyth sounded shocked.