The Lords of the North. Bernard Cornwell

restored the mitre, then leaned forward and kissed the ruby ring. ‘You will note,’ he said in a voice made hoarse by emotion, ‘that the holy flesh is uncorrupted,’ he paused to stroke one of the saint’s bony hands, ‘and that miracle is a sure and certain sign of his sanctity.’ He leaned forward and this time kissed the saint full on the open, shrivelled lips. ‘Oh most holy Cuthbert,’ he prayed aloud, ‘guide us and lead us and bring us to your glory in the name of Him who died for us and upon whose right hand you now sit in splendour everlasting, amen.’

      ‘Amen,’ the monks chimed. The closest monks had got up from the floor so they could see the uncorrupted saint and most of them cried as they gazed at the yellowing face.

      Eadred looked up at me again. ‘In this church, young man,’ he said, ‘is the spiritual soul of Northumbria. Here, in these chests, are our miracles, our treasures, our glory, and the means by which we speak with God to seek his protection. While these precious and holy things are safe, we are safe, and once,’ he stood as he said that last word and his voice grew much harder, ‘once all these things were under the protection of the lords of Bebbanburg, but that protection failed! The pagans came, the monks were slaughtered, and the men of Bebbanburg cowered behind their walls rather than ride to slaughter the pagans. But our forefathers in Christ saved these things, and we have wandered ever since, wandered across the wild lands, and we keep these things still, but one day we shall make a great church and these relics will shine forth across a holy land. That holy land is where I lead these people!’ He waved his hand to indicate the folk waiting outside the church. ‘God has sent me an army,’ he shouted, ‘and that army will triumph, but I am not the man to lead it. God and Saint Cuthbert sent me a dream in which they showed me the king who will take us all to our promised land. He showed me King Guthred!’

      He stood and raised Guthred’s arm aloft and the gesture provoked applause from the congregation. Guthred looked surprised rather than regal, and I just looked down at the dead saint.

      Cuthbert had been the abbot and bishop of Lindisfarena, the island that lay just north of Bebbanburg, and for almost two hundred years his body had lain in a crypt on the island until the Viking raids became too threatening and, to save the saintly corpse, the monks had taken the dead man inland. They had been wandering Northumbria ever since. Eadred disliked me because my family had failed to protect the holy relics, but the strength of Bebbanburg was its position on the sea-lashed crag, and only a fool would take its garrison beyond the walls to fight. If I had a choice between keeping Bebbanburg and abandoning a relic, then I would have surrendered the whole calendar of dead saints. Holy corpses are cheap, but fortresses like Bebbanburg are rare.

      ‘Behold!’ Eadred shouted, still holding Guthred’s arm aloft, ‘the king of Haliwerfolkland!’

      The king of what? I thought I had misheard, but I had not. Haliwerfolkland, Eadred had said, and it meant the Land of the Holy Man People. That was Eadred’s name for Guthred’s kingdom. Saint Cuthbert, of course, was the holy man, but whoever was king of his land would be a sheep among wolves. Ivarr, Kjartan and my uncle were the wolves. They were the men who led proper forces of trained soldiers, while Eadred was hoping to make a kingdom on the back of a dream, and I had no doubts that his dream-born sheep would end up being savaged by the wolves. Still, for the moment, Cair Ligualid was my best refuge in Northumbria, because my enemies would need to cross the hills to find me and, besides, I had a taste for this kind of madness. In madness lies change, in change is opportunity and in opportunity are riches.

      ‘Now,’ Eadred let go of Guthred’s hand and turned on me, ‘you will swear fealty to our king and his country.’

      Guthred actually winked at me then, and I obediently went on my knees and reached for his right hand, but Eadred knocked my hands away. ‘You swear to the saint,’ he hissed at me.

      ‘To the saint?’

      ‘Place your hands on Saint Cuthbert’s most holy hands,’ Eadred ordered me, ‘and say the words.’

      I put my hands over Saint Cuthbert’s fingers and I could feel the big ruby ring under my own fingers, and I gave the jewel a twitch just to see whether the stone was loose and would come free, but it seemed well fixed in its setting. ‘I swear to be your man,’ I said to the corpse, ‘and to serve you faithfully.’ I tried to shift the ring again, but the dead fingers were stiff and the ruby would not move.

      ‘You swear by your life?’ Eadred asked sternly.

      I gave the ring another twitch, but it really was immovable. ‘I swear on my life,’ I said respectfully and never, in all that life, have I taken an oath so lightly. How can an oath to a dead man be binding?

      ‘And you swear to serve King Guthred faithfully?’

      ‘I do,’ I said.

      ‘And to be an enemy to all his enemies?’

      ‘I swear it,’ I said.

      ‘And you will serve Saint Cuthbert even to the end of your life?’

      ‘I will.’

      ‘Then you may kiss the most blessed Cuthbert,’ Eadred said. I leaned over the coffin’s edge to kiss the folded hands. ‘No!’ Eadred protested. ‘On the lips!’ I shuffled on my knees, then bent and kissed the corpse on its dry, scratchy lips.

      ‘Praise God,’ Eadred said. Then he made Guthred swear to serve Cuthbert and the church watched as the slave king knelt and kissed the corpse. The monks sang as the folk in the church were allowed to see Cuthbert for themselves. Hild shuddered when she came to the coffin and she fell to her knees, tears streaming down her face, and I had to lift her up and lead her away. Willibald was similarly overcome, but his face just glowed with happiness. Gisela, I noticed, did not bow to the corpse. She looked at it with curiosity, but it was plain it meant nothing to her and I deduced she was a pagan still. She stared at the dead man, then looked at me and smiled. Her eyes, I thought, were brighter than the ruby on the dead saint’s finger.

      And so Guthred came to Cair Ligualid. I thought then, and still think now, that it was all nonsense, but it was a magical nonsense, and the dead swordsman had made himself liege to a dead man and the slave had become a king. The gods were laughing.

      Later, much later, I realised I was doing what Alfred would have wanted me to do. I was helping the Christians. There were two wars in those years. The obvious struggle was between Saxon and Dane, but there was also combat between pagans and Christians. Most Danes were pagan and most Saxons were Christian, so the two wars appeared to be the same fight, but in Northumbria it all became confused, and that was Abbot Eadred’s cleverness.

      What Eadred did was to end the war between the Saxons and the Danes in Cumbraland, and he did it by choosing Guthred. Guthred, of course, was a Dane and that meant Cumbraland’s Danes were ready to follow him and, because he had been proclaimed king by a Saxon abbot, the Saxons were equally prepared to support him. Thus the two biggest warring tribes of Cumbraland, the Danes and Saxons, were united, while the Britons, and a good many Britons still lived in Cumbraland, were also Christians and their priests told them to accept Eadred’s choice and so they did.

      It is one thing to proclaim a king and another for the king to rule, but Eadred had made a shrewd choice. Guthred was a good man, but he was also the son of Hardicnut who had called himself king of Northumbria, so Guthred had a claim to the crown, and none of Cumbraland’s thegns was strong enough to challenge him. They needed a king because, for too long, they had squabbled among themselves and suffered from the Norse raids out of Ireland and from the savage incursions from Strath Clota. Guthred, by uniting Dane and Saxon, could now marshal stronger forces to face those enemies. There was one man who might have been a rival. Ulf, he was called, and he was a Dane who owned land south of Cair Ligualid and he had greater wealth than any other thegn in Cumbraland, but he was old and lame and without sons and so he offered fealty to Guthred, and Ulf’s example persuaded the other Danes to accept Eadred’s choice. They knelt to him one by one and he greeted them by name, raised them and embraced them.

      ‘I really should become a Christian,’ he told me on the morning after our arrival.

      ‘Why?’