Born of the Sun (55 page)

Sure enough, the following week brought the unwelcome news that the eorls Bertred and Wuffa had joined Ceawlin at Silchester with some hundred and twenty more men. Finally the truth dawned on Cutha. “He has armed the coerls,” he said to Aethelbert and Sigurd as they sat around Ceawlin’s table in the king’s hall. “That is how he has gotten the men. Sword of Woden, he has armed the ceorls!”

“Such a simple solution,” Sigurd said with a laugh. “So simple that it would only occur to Ceawlin to do it.”

“This is not a laughing matter,” Cutha said angrily. “He has a war band of close on three hundred men!”

“We have more,” Aethelbert said. “And if we want to be safe, then we can arm our ceorls too.”

“The Winchester ceorls owe allegiance to Ceawlin,” Sigurd pointed out.

“They owe allegiance to whatever king holds Winchester,” Aethelbert answered, fire in his eyes. “If we command them to fight for us, then they will fight.”

“We can give them arms,” Cutha said grimly. “But once the battle begins, can we count on for whom they would fight?” There was a devastating silence. “Ceawlin is well-liked,” Cutha added at last. “I would not trust my back to his ceorls.”

“We are still a hundred men stronger than he,” said Aethelbert.

“That is so.” Cutha squared his shoulders. He had aged these last months, Sigurd thought. He was beginning to look like an old man. “And ceorls do not know how to fight. We have the advantage yet.” He turned to look at Aethelbert, “We must not let Ceawlin frighten us into doing anything foolish.”

Aethelbert jutted his jaw forward. “Ceawlin does not frighten me!”

“Then he should,” Sigurd said. “I have fought beside him often enough. Ceawlin has never been defeated. You have seen him in battle, both of you. He is matchless.”

Cutha was quick to point out to his son, “You have never been defeated either.”

Sigurd smiled crookedly. “But you see, I have always had Ceawlin to tell me what to do.”

Aethelbert slammed his hand upon the table. “I will hear no talk of defeat!” he shouted. He got to his feet. “Let him come, this warrior-hero, and I shall show him what defeat means!” He strode out of the room, shoulders hunched forward, eyes on the ground. Cutha and Sigurd watched him go; then Sigurd put a hand upon the table and pushed himself to his feet. “You had better send immediately to Cynigils and Witgar,” he advised his father. “It would be wise to gather our forces without delay.”

Cutha nodded. “I will be in the great hall if you want me,” Sigurd added before he too left the room.

He went not to the great hall, however, but sought out Niniane. He had not had private speech with her since the death of Cerdic, but now he forced his unwilling feet to take the path to the princes’ hall.

Silence fell when Sigurd came in the door. He had the distinct impression that everyone in the room had taken a step backward and the iron bands that seemed to be constricting his chest squeezed tighter. Then Crida was coming forward to meet him.

“I have come to speak to your mother,” Sigurd said to Ceawlin’s eldest surviving son.

Crida’s eyes told all too clearly what he was feeling, but his voice was coldly polite as he said, “My mother is resting.”

Sigurd had to see Niniane now, knew he would not be able to come back here again. “Will you ask her if she will see me, Prince?”

Crida nodded once, shortly, and turned to go into Ceawlin’s old room. The wait seemed to Sigurd to last forever. No one spoke. Even the younger children were staring at him with hostility, or so it seemed to him. Finally Crida returned. “My mother will see you,” he said. “Come with me.”

Sigurd followed Crida to the sleeping room. Crida came in with him and closed the door. Sigurd looked at Niniane.

She had been resting; the bed still bore the imprint of her body. She was standing now, near the clothes chest along the far wall. Her face was thin, he thought. Too thin. There were shadows beneath her large smoke-gray eyes. She was now obviously pregnant. His heart was wrung with pity for her. “Niniane,” he said. “Ceawlin is in Silchester with nigh on three hundred men. He should shortly be setting out to come south. Do you want me to send a messenger to tell him about Cerdic?”

Niniane sat down on the chest. Crida moved as if to come to her side, but she shook her head at him and looked to Sigurd. “I keep thinking of that,” she said. “He does not know. All this time, Cerdic has been in the earth, and Ceawlin does not know.”

The band around Sigurd’s chest tightened still more. “I realize that, Niniane. It is up to you. If you think he should know now, I will send someone to tell him. Or you can wait and tell him yourself.”

Her lips were very pale. She looked into his face and said, “I think he should know.”

Their eyes held. Then, “I think so too,” Sigurd replied.

She lowered her lashes very slightly. “All right. Send someone, then.”

He nodded and turned toward the door. He put his hand on the handle and paused for a moment, hoping she would say something else, but she did not. He pushed the door open and went out, closing it softly behind him.

Sigurd sent one of his own thanes, a man whom Ceawlin knew well. The king stood like a rock all through the man’s recital. “When did this happen?” Ceawlin asked when the thane finally fell silent.

“The beginning of September, my lord. It was when the young prince first learned you were at Wyckholm. Apparently he was trying to join you.”

Ceawlin still had much of his summer tan, but under the sunburn he was very white. “How is my wife?” he asked.

“She is living with your sons in the princes’ hall, my lord. She is … she is with child.”

Ceawlin closed his eyes. Very briefly. When they opened again they were glittering, but his voice was steady and cool. “You may return to Winchester,” he said.

“Yes, my lord.” The thane took a step backward. “Do … do you have any message, my lord?”

“No,” said Ceawlin. His eyes were a brilliant turquoise. “My message is my sword.”

Sigurd’s thane looked away from the king, nodded, and backed out of the room.

Sigurd’s messenger was not gone five minutes before Ceawlin ordered his war band to make ready to march. It was late afternoon but the king did not delay; he moved his men onto the Roman road and began to push south. The main body of the army he allowed to halt as darkness fell, but a scouting party on horseback was sent ahead to Alford, the manor of Cutha’s partner in treachery, Cynigils.

Cynigils had not yet moved his men to Winchester and in the dead of night he was roused by one of his thanes with the news that Ceawlin was almost upon him. Cynigils’ men had mistaken the king’s advance scouts for his whole force. The eorl routed out his men in a panic and fled from Alford, fled east, away from Winchester and the battle that now was looming so ominously near.

When this news was brought to Ceawlin at eight the following morning, he quickly resumed his southward march. By afternoon he was within sight of the walls of Winchester.

Witgar was not yet in Winchester either. No one had expected Ceawlin to move so quickly. Cutha stood on the walls of the royal enclave and watched with incredulity the array of the king’s war band drawn up out of the reach of arrow shot. Without Witgar the numbers within and without were even, and Cutha did not want to meet Ceawlin on even terms. He turned to Aethelbert, who was standing beside him. “I have sent a messenger to Witgar. If he will only advance boldly, we will have Ceawlin caught between the two of us.”

Aethelbert nodded shortly. His searching eyes had caught sight of a tall fair-haired figure standing with a group to the left of the large mass of men. “There he is,” he said. His brown eyes burned. “There is no mistaking Ceawlin.”

Cutha looked also. “No. There is not.” He turned away from the wall. “He will not try to force his way into Winchester, not with his family here. We have time. We will wait for Witgar.”

Ceawlin, however, was not waiting for Witgar. Hours before his war band had reached Winchester he had sent a messenger to seek out the King of Wight. What he offered Witgar was simple: a marriage between Crida, heir to the kingdom of Wessex, and Witgar’s granddaughter, the Princess Auda. The price of such a marriage would be Witgar’s recognition of Ceawlin as king and his consequent desertion of Cutha.

The King of Wight looked at the situation, remembered how uncomfortable it had been trying to reign in Winchester in Ceawlin’s stead, and agreed. After all, he told himself, he was getting what he had wanted in the first place. A union of Wessex and Wight, with his blood flowing in the nation’s future kings.

Once Ceawlin had Witgar’s acceptance, he sent a messenger to Winchester bearing the white banner on a raised sword that signaled truce. The messenger was let in the gate and was brought to Cutha and Aethelbert in the king’s hall. Sigurd was there as well, seated at the end of the table in such a way that seemed to indicate he was not going to be an active participant in the discussion.

The messenger was Sigbert, the young thane who had accompanied Ceawlin to Bryn Atha and so had missed being taken captive. “My lord,” he said to Cutha, his face wooden, “I have come to tell you that the King of Wight has made peace with Ceawlin.”

“What?”
The outraged voice belonged to Aethelbert.

Cutha sat silent. Not even to himself had he admitted this possibility, but he had known, in his heart, that he feared it.

“What were the terms?” It was Sigurd speaking, his voice quiet, almost conversational.

“My lord, a marriage between Prince Crida and the Princess Auda.”

“I see.” Sigurd looked at his father. “Very clever, Father. Just what Witgar originally wanted.”

Cutha felt ill. “Is that all?” he asked Sigbert.

“No, my lord. I am empowered to offer you terms for surrender.”

Cutha let out a long harsh breath. “What are they?”

“The King of East Anglia will be allowed free passage for himself and his men back to his own country.” Beside him Aethelbert began to breathe heavily through his nose. Cutha made a gesture for him to keep quiet.

“And?” he said.

“For yourself, my lord, the king does offer you your life.”

My life, thought Cutha. But his property would be gone, given to one of the men who had kept faith with Ceawlin. His influence, his power, all gone….

“For the eorl Sigurd …” Sigbert was going on. He paused and turned to Cutha’s son. Sigurd did not meet the young thane’s gaze but sat with his eyes focused on the table as if he were utterly absorbed in studying the pattern of the wood. “The king does offer you full pardon, my lord,” Sigbert said to him, “if you will accept his offers of peace.”

There was absolute silence in the room. Cutha and Aethelbert would keep their lives; Sigurd would be forgiven.

“Wait outside,” Cutha said to Ceawlin’s messenger, and the young thane nodded and left the room.

“The nerve of him,” Aethelbert snarled. “As if I would go back to East Anglia like a beaten dog, with no battle fought, no victor decided.”

Cutha ignored the king and turned to his son. “Sigurd?” he asked.

Sigurd was looking away. “Whatever you decide, I will abide by, Father,” he answered.

Thank the gods, Cutha thought. He put his head into his hands and thought of Ceawlin, seeing in his mind’s eye the boy he had helped to put in the high seat of Wessex not so many years ago. But the picture of that smiling boy was overlain by a newer picture, a hard-eyed Ceawlin who meant to rule and would not suffer his authority to be brooked. Ceawlin would let him live, but the life he faced—a pensioner at Wokham, surely—was not attractive.

He sent once more for Sigbert, and when the king’s messenger was standing before him, he looked up and said, “I will not yield to kiss the ground before Ceawlin’s feet.” His glance went briefly to the bent head of his son, then back to Sigbert. He said, “We will fight.”

The battle site was chosen—a field some five miles from Winchester. Sigurd knew it well. It was as level as the dueling grounds; appropriate, for this battle would be the final bout in a duel that had started between Ceawlin and Cutha some two years ago and more. An hour after the return of Sigbert to Ceawlin, the watchers on the walls of Winchester saw the king’s war band break camp and depart. Ceawlin would wait for Cutha at the appointed grounds.

Cutha sent word round to his men that they should make ready to fight. They would march the following morning for Torfield, the designated scene of battle.

Aethelbert bustled among his men, barking orders, inspecting weapons, tense and excited about the coming fight. He looked forward to the morrow, burning to redeem his reputation from the humiliating defeat at Gild Ford.

Cutha sat by himself as the torches cast flickering shadows on the walls of his hall and the long night stretched out ahead. His heart was heavy. All his great plans, his schemes, his allies … gone. Oh, Aethelbert remained, but Aethelbert was a fool. The single experienced battle leader he had left to him was his son. Sigurd was the only one he could trust not to change sides at the last minute and betray him. And Sigurd’s heart was with Ceawlin.

Ceawlin. Cutha had underestimated him, had underestimated how secure was his hold on his kingdom. He had seemed to rule so lightly, had given so much power into the hands of others. But Wessex had been prosperous these last ten years and more; merchants and ceorls and thanes had eaten well and slept quietly in the knowledge that their rights were protected. If their immediate overlords became too overbearing, they always knew they could appeal to the king.

Cutha had not dared to raise Ceawlin’s ceorls or ask the merchants of Venta for men. He had been reduced to calling on his own primal loyalties, the men who had sworn to follow him as lord and the men who had sworn to follow his son. And even among these, there was lingering affection for Ceawlin. Cutha would not be leading a highhearted army tomorrow, and he knew it.

Sigurd knew this also.

Cutha’s son was glad, though. Glad this ordeal would finally be coming to an end. He was so immensely weary of it all. Years and years of a divided heart had worn him out.