The heavy oak door slammed open with a crash and the boy rushed into the hall. The busy chatter and laughing banter stopped, as eyes turned to stare and was replaced by an undercurrent of murmurs and whispers. There were two long rows of plank tables set either side of the brightly flaring log fire on the hearth at the centre of the hall. The people and the warriors of the household sat on benches and had been busy with their breakfast. Several dogs slept in the warmth around the stone hearth, the wood smoke drifted lazily into the tall roof of blackened beams and thatch. He fought against his fear as, for an instant he thought of running away, hiding from the staring eyes. His breath came in rough gasps and he coughed on the smoky air. Tears overflowed the boy’s eyes as he stumbled through the billowing smoke, he searched the rows of faces that peered at him. He’d not been here before and had never seen so many folk in one place. He knew the Lord by sight, but couldn’t see him past the fire’s bright glare and the smoke. The boy knew that the Lord would sit at the top table. Suddenly he was through the smoke and before him, stretching almost the whole width of the hall was a table set above the rest and covered in a white linen cloth. He needed to speak to the big man sitting in the heavy oak chair at the centre of the high table. The King’s man, the Lord Odda. He rushed toward him, tripped and fell to his knees.
‘What’s this.’ shouted a man, as he rose from a stool at the side and drew a wickedly long dagger.
‘It’s only a young’un Edmund, barely a whelp.’ said the big man in a gentle voice. ‘Let him through. Perhaps he brings us some amusement. Come here boy.’
The boy got up and, with bowed head, stumbled forward. His chest heaved and his breath came in great shuddering sobs as he fought for his voice.
‘Must...must speak to my Lord Odda.’ the boy managed.
He’d escaped from a beating by the look of him, thought Odda as he stood and walked around the long table. Both the lad’s eyes were puffed and dark blood oozed from a matted mess on the side of his head. He watched as a bright red trickle roll from above his ear and ran to the collar of his jerkin. Tears streamed twin channels through the dirt on his face.
‘You’ve found him boy. What is it?’
Outside, in the early stillness, a cock crew. The boy, fists clenched tight in his efforts to fight his pain, fear and horror, glanced anxiously over his shoulder.
‘Vikings!’ he gasped, dropping to his knees. His eyes rolled to show the pale whites through swollen slits. ‘They...They’re down in the village...Now!’
The immediate, total silence in the hall was tense, like a full drawn bowstring. Quivering and waiting.
‘Edmund!’ shouted Odda, ‘Get the men. Grab what weapons are to hand, we leave!’
The hall erupted into noise and action. Men snatched up spears and axes at the doorway as they ran out into the early morning light and sprinted down the worn track towards the village.
Odda’s wife, Corisande, strode across to the young messenger who was now quietly sobbing, swaying on his knees, a moaning despair leaking past his lips. She put an arm around his shoulders and gently lifted him into her arms and carried him to a cot that had been pushed to the side of the hall. The youngster trembled with fear and tried to pull away from her, but she calmed him with her soft voice and gentle touch.
He couldn’t fight it anymore and gave in to his exhaustion, his thin body went limp and he felt himself sinking into a deep, dark sleep.
Why, he’s as light as a goose feather thought Corisande, poor brave little boy. Turning, she called a maid and told her to fetch clean boiled water and some bandage strips. It’s as well that you are unconscious little man, I think this will be painful for you. Carefully, but thoroughly, she cleaned and bound the wound on his head. Once she was satisfied with her work she stripped the filthy clothes from the thin body, washed him with her own soap then wrapped him in a soft woollen blanket. Although she had never had children of her own, instinctively, she knew just what to do to give him comfort.
~ ~ ~
The tumbling stream of eager warriors, Odda at their head, bounded and leapt along the forest track that threaded its way down to the tiny hamlet of Stowey.
The plague of Norsemen had not bothered with them here for some while. The men were excited, despite the danger. The steep valley sides opened out and, as they came to the village outskirts, they saw the first bodies. Several men and women had been hung from the boughs of trees. Their faces blackened and heavily swollen tongues stuck out of their mouths. All of the naked corpses had been horribly mutilated.
‘Cut them down.’ ordered Odda as the men rushed by.
They tore on through the remains of the village, fires still raged fiercely and a whimpering child wandered, through the carnage in a daze of fear and shock.
At the centre of the village was the tiny stone-built chapel. Men raced past, some hastily crossing themselves. But some paused by the small group of hunched villagers to hear what had happened. A tall, stick of a youth sniffed importantly and told his tale.
The priest had caught a lone barbarian in the act of desecrating and looting his church. In his anger, he’d stepped up behind him and knocked him senseless with a heavy bronze candlestick. Some of the villagers had hidden in the chapel desperately hoping for sanctuary, and one of them, being a huntsman, had set about skinning the unfortunate man while he still lived. He’d only just finished explained the youth and with a sweep of his arm he stood back to reveal their grisly work. They had taken the skin and nailed it to the church door as a warning. The outline of a bloody hand brushed the polished stone of the threshold.
The few remaining able-bodied villagers joined with the Odda’s warriors and ran hard to catch them up. They panted and puffed along the track towards the glitter of the nearby, broad sweep of the Severn Sea.
Soon they topped a short rise and came within sight of the Norse raiders. They were making their way towards two sleek dragon-ships that rode the shining dazzle of waves in the bay. They dragged with them a handful of prisoners, mainly women but some children. Odda’s men, Edmund leading now, whooped and rushed at them while the youngest boys were ordered to stay back.
The Vikings saw them almost in the same instant. A tall Dane with a flowing mane of deep, coppery-red hair turned at the top of the beach and sounded an alert on a bull’s horn. And, with no more thought than snapping a twig, the dozen or so captives were swiftly killed and their captors surged forward to escape.
Odda’s men, fuelled now with fresh anger, were too fast for the plunder laden laggards and soon caught up with them. The butchery was not a credit to our people as honourable warriors. The enemy’s blood tainted the foam at the sea’s edge as limbs were hacked and necks severed by lead-weighted, swinging war axes.
The final, valiant clashes of sword against desperate shield rang across the salt-marsh that bordered the grey seas and our men ground the bodies of the fallen enemy under their heels as they pushed toward those already wading out to their powerful craft. But they were just moments too late.
As they watched, from the sandy ridge at the top of the beach, a rippling swing of oar-shafts glistened in the sun like silvery wings as they dug deeply into the water. Each of the vessels used the beat of a great drum to call the time to the oarsmen, and the combined pounding sounded like the growling rumble of a huge beast.
Defiant jeers and coarse laughter were hurled at us across the widening gap of water. And with military precision, brightly coloured sails were hoisted and a creaming curl of foam rose beneath the bow of each of the dragon-ships. Unopposed, they pressed north-eastwards into our country’s heartland and away from our challenge. As we watched, the growling rumble of the drums slowly died away and each of the longships nosed into the shelter of a small bay on the distant island of Steep Holme.
A summer mist swirled across the sea, closing off the view like a widow’s veil and they turned away to thread their way back through narrow forest trails to home. Men were sent to help the folk in the village and a messenger was dispatched to discover the fate of the sentries at the lookout post, but everybody knew what they would find. Tonight’s watchmen would not sleep, as their predecessors had done.
The men squabbled among themselves as they walked back through the steepening sides of the coombe towards home. It seemed to be the usual consequence after a skirmish, a heavy cloak of irritable, bad temper fell across the warriors as their passions cooled.