Sword Song. Bernard Cornwell

Chippenham, Wiltshire Cirrenceastre Cirencester, Gloucestershire Cisseceastre Chichester, Sussex Coccham Cookham, Berkshire Colaun, River River Colne, Essex Contwaraburg Canterbury, Kent Cornwalum Cornwall Cracgelad Cricklade, Wiltshire Dunastopol Dunstable (Roman name Durocobrivis), Bedfordshire Dunholm Durham, County Durham Eoferwic York, Yorkshire Ethandun Edington, Wiltshire Exanceaster Exeter, Devon Fleot River Fleet, London Frankia Germany Fughelness Foulness Island, Essex Grantaceaster Cambridge, Cambridgeshire Gyruum Jarrow, County Durham Hastengas Hastings, Sussex Horseg Horsey Island, Essex Hothlege River Hadleigh, Essex Hrofeceastre Rochester, Kent Hwealf River Crouch, Essex Lundene London Mæides Stana Maidstone, Kent Medwæg River Medway, Kent Oxnaforda Oxford, Oxfordshire Padintune Paddington, Greater London Pant River Blackwater, Essex Scaepege Isle of Sheppey, Kent Sceaftes Eye Sashes Island (at Coccham) Sceobyrig Shoebury, Essex Scerhnesse Sheerness, Kent Sture River Stour, Essex Sutherge Surrey Suthriganaweorc Southwark, Greater London Swealwe River Swale, Kent Temes River Thames Thunresleam Thundersley, Essex Wæced Watchet, Somerset Wæclingastræt Watling Street Welengaford Wallingford, Oxfordshire Werham Wareham, Dorset Wiltunscir Wiltshire Wintanceaster Winchester, Hampshire Wocca’s Dun South Ockenden, Essex Wodenes Eye Odney Island (at Coccham)

       PROLOGUE

      Darkness. Winter. A night of frost and no moon.

      We floated on the River Temes, and beyond the boat’s high bow I could see the stars reflected on the shimmering water. The river was in spate as melted snow fed it from countless hills. The winterbournes were flowing from the chalk uplands of Wessex. In summer those streams would be dry, but now they foamed down the long green hills and filled the river and flowed to the distant sea.

      Our boat, which had no name, lay close to the Wessex bank. North across the river lay Mercia. Our bows pointed upstream. We were hidden beneath the leafless, bending branches of three willow trees, held there against the current by a leather mooring rope tied to one of those branches.

      There were thirty-eight of us in that nameless boat, which was a trading ship that worked the upper reaches of the Temes. The ship’s master was called Ralla and he stood beside me with one hand on the steering-oar. I could hardly see him in the darkness, but knew he wore a leather jerkin and had a sword at his side. The rest of us were in leather and mail, had helmets and carried shields, axes, swords or spears. Tonight we would kill.

      Sihtric, my servant, squatted beside me and stroked a whetstone along the blade of his short-sword. ‘She says she loves me,’ he told me.

      ‘Of course she says that,’ I said.

      He paused, and when he spoke again his voice had brightened, as though he had been encouraged by my words. ‘And I must be nineteen by now, lord! Maybe even twenty?’

      ‘Eighteen?’ I suggested.

      ‘I could have been married four years ago, lord!’

      We spoke almost in whispers. The night was full of noises. The water rippled, the bare branches clattered in the wind, a night creature splashed into the river, a vixen howled like a dying soul, and somewhere an owl hooted. The boat creaked. Sihtric’s stone hissed and scraped on the steel. A shield thumped against a rower’s bench. I dared not speak louder, despite the night’s noises, because the enemy ship was upstream of us and the men who had gone ashore from that ship would have left sentries on board. Those sentries might have seen us as we slipped downstream on the Mercian bank, but by now they would surely have thought we were long gone towards Lundene.

      ‘But why marry a whore?’ I asked Sihtric.

      ‘She’s …’ Sihtric began.

      ‘She’s old,’ I snarled, ‘maybe thirty. And she’s addled. Ealhswith only has to see a man and her thighs fly apart! If you lined up every man who’d tupped that whore you’d have an army big enough to conquer all Britain.’ Beside me Ralla sniggered. ‘You’d be in that army, Ralla?’ I asked.

      ‘Twenty times over, lord,’ the shipmaster said.