IV

The church was packed. Orm had to use his shoulders to force a way in through a crowd of prelates, armed warriors, and the retainers of William and Harold. The atmosphere was tense; English and Normans alike fingered the hilts of their swords.

Harold and his brother Gyrth had been brought to stand before William. They were a contrast, the tall, red-haired, blue-eyed, well-built Englishmen before the short, portly Norman. But with his face shaved and the jet black hair at the back of his head scraped to the scalp, William glowered with menace. At the altar stood Odo, bishop and half-brother to the Bastard. In his expensive vestments Odo was a sleeker copy of his corpulent brother. He held a leather-bound Bible, and a small gilded box.

Sihtric, with the avid ears of a courtier, picked up the mutterings of the English in the crowd. William had sprung the trap he had evidently been planning all along. The box held by Odo contained a holy relic, the finger of a saint. Now William required Harold to swear allegiance to him, an oath to be sworn on the relic - and Harold was to promise to uphold any claim William made to the throne of England.

Orm, astonished, realised that he had been catapulted into the eye of a storm that might engulf a kingdom.

Harold, his face like thunder, glared around. When he saw Sihtric he beckoned him. The priest was shocked and frightened, but when he was allowed to pass he hurried forward, and Orm and Godgifu followed.

‘I think I need some holy advice, priest,’ Harold muttered.

‘I am here to serve, lord.’

‘I can’t believe the arrogance of the man. This blustering brute demands such an oath of me. Well, it is a trap into which I have fallen. What should I do? If I make the oath and keep it, William will surely take the throne. You saw his methods, what he did in Brittany. I will not have that befall England. But to take the oath and break it would be a sin.’ The oath was the very foundation of the law, binding kings and lords as well as free men. Oath-breaking was a grave offence - and to break an oath sworn on holy relics was graver yet. ‘But if I fail to take the oath at all—’

‘Then we will all be cut down, brother, here and now,’ Gyrth said grimly.

Orm saw Harold’s hand move towards his sword, and the tension in the church tightened even further. ‘At least we can die fighting.’

Sihtric spoke rapidly to Harold in English, perhaps hoping that William could not hear. ‘You are twice the man the Bastard is, ten times. In your wisdom you are a man of the future; William is nothing but aggression and greed, a throwback to a darker past. You must think of the greater good, lord.’

‘The greater good? You’re saying I should take the oath to stay alive, knowing I will not keep it?’ Harold looked agonised. ‘But my soul, priest,’ he said. ‘My soul.’

Sihtric said, ‘An oath made under duress is not binding, and no sin.’ But even Orm the pagan knew that he was lying.

Odo advanced with the Bible and the reliquary. Harold, his expression torn, placed a hand on the reliquary, faced William the Bastard, and gave his oath.