The Lost Tales of Mercia (13 page)

Almost immediately, shapes seemed to form
from the blackness and move towards her. She felt unexpectedly calm
as she pulled her dirk from her belt and slashed at them. They were
large and heavy men, weighted down by their axes and chainmail; she
could hear them coming long before they reached her. She smiled
with satisfaction as her little blade met flesh, slicing someone’s
palm as he clutched for her.

Despite this, the men formed a line that
blocked her from fleeing into the city. As surely as she could
detect the warriors approaching, so could she also sense the ones
lingering nearby. Her own hearth companions were in or near her
chamber, and far too few to match Canute’s. Crying out with
exasperation, she turned and went the other way.

Her feet carried her of her own will to the
dining hall. At first she did not know why. The slaves within, who
had been enjoying the leftovers of the night meal in the glow of
candlelight, fled in confusion and embarrassment. In their absence,
her gaze carried down the littered table to a single goblet,
shining amidst the scraps.

She hurried to it, picked it up, and slammed
it against the wood.

At first, the jolt only seemed to carry up
her fingers and wrist, causing her pain and feeding her anger.
Shouting, she struck again. The metalwork of the cup cut into her
hands, and she wasn’t sure if the red liquid slipping from her grip
was leftover wine or her own blood. It hardly seemed to matter as
she beat the table with all her might, hoping against reason that
if she struck hard enough, she would break it.

Somehow, through her own haze of huffing and
hitting, she felt Canute nearby, standing and watching her. He was
not trying to stop her anymore; only witnessing her exercise of
futility. She sensed his satisfaction as something finally cracked
under her exertions; but it was not the goblet. It was the
table.

She yelled with rage, turned around, and
flung the cup into the embers of the hearth. Sparks ignited and
gushed into the air near Canute. They seemed to reflect in his eyes
as he glared at her. They stared at each other a long while, the
warmth of the fire in between them. Alfgifu felt that her own hair
had spilled below her shoulders, which distressed her, for she
hated the thin, frizzy nature of it. Though she normally kept it
tightly bound, it must have fallen loose during her frenzy.

“What else did Eadric give you?” she
demanded, breaking the silence.

He did not answer her. “If you ever command
me to be silent again,” he said, “I will burn your lips with
boiling water.”

She flinched as he stepped towards her. She
tried to maintain her stream of thought against a crashing tide of
fear. She had heard of Eadric’s gifts to the Vikings before; what
were they? He had given them livestock, and food, and ornaments,
but most importantly, he had given them hostages. Yes, somewhere,
there were hostages …

Canute surprised her by reaching out and
grasping her hair. He twisted it in his hand until she cried out,
then he pulled her down, forcing her to her knees.

She heard the ring of metal as he pulled a
knife from his belt, much longer and sharper than the sort that she
carried, and her skin crawled with terror. It glinted in her eyes
as he brought it near her face. Then he curved it around her head,
and swept it through her hair.

The sensation was strange as the pain of his
grip fell away, freed by the blade. She watched with something like
wonder as she watched the pathetic, lifeless strands fall to the
floor.

When he was done, Canute stepped back and
surveyed his work. “Much better,” he said, and sheathed the
knife.

He turned and strolled away, tossing one
last piece of her hair behind him. She reached up with a trembling
hand and felt her neck where it was now bare but for a few ragged
edges of the remaining hair. Why had he done that? Would it do any
good to wonder? She did not think she would ever know the answer,
if there was one. Perhaps he did it solely so she
would
wonder.

His housecarls were waiting for him further
down the hall. “Take her to her lodge,” he told them, “and don’t
let her leave. I must treat her like a prisoner until she learns to
behave.” He turned his head towards her slightly, intending that
she hear every word.

“And her housecarls, my lord?” one
asked.

“Kill them.”

“Hey!” She scrambled to her feet. “No!”

Canute looked at her curiously. He seemed
surprised. “I kill them,” he said, “or you release them of their
service to you.”

“I—I—” She felt as if she was tearing apart
inside. Canute must have guessed how difficult it would be for her
to make a decision like this. She hated the thought of releasing
them of their service to her; it was a severe blow to her pride, a
destruction of all the work she had done to make them loyal to her
in the first place. But was that really worth making them die,
instead?

She hesitated so long that the housecarls
began to move, assuming that she would not have the will to save
their lives.

“I will release them,” she rasped. Her legs
were wobbly as she forced herself to walk past them. She did not
need to look at Canute to know that he wore an expression of
victory.

Perhaps he would win this round, she
thought. But he would not win them all.

*

The Vikings and the people of Lindsey had
not yet mobilized when King Ethelred attacked with his fyrd.

She was still imprisoned in her chamber when
it happened. There was nothing she could do. She awoke to the sound
of yelling. She felt heat pour through the wooden walls. She heard
horses neighing and blades clashing.

“What’s going on?” cried Alfgifu to Canute’s
housecarls. “Go and see, you fools!”

A few of them obeyed her. A few stayed
behind, determined to keep constant watch over her.

The acrid smell of smoke bit the air. People
screamed. Swords tolled. Light flashed beyond her shuttered
windows.

Fear seized her limbs. Her heart fluttered
in her ribs, weak and rapid like a butterfly’s wings. Suddenly she
found it hard to breathe. She hated fear. She wanted to believe it
could not touch her. She wished she could forget how it felt, that
day the king’s soldiers barged into her beautiful manor, stabbing
the men who had been loyal to her all her life, trying to catch her
mother Wulfrun as she ran screaming, then grabbing her brother and
throwing him to the floor …

Alfgifu flinched as another scream echoed
through the walls. She nearly fainted when the door of the lodge
opened, but it was only one of Canute’s housecarls returning. She
glimpsed blood splashing in the air before he closed the door
behind him.

“It’s Ethelred’s army,” said the
housecarl.

“How many soldiers?” gasped Alfgifu.

“A few thousand. Hard to say—they’re pouring
in.”

All of the housecarls exchanged uncertain
glances. They could not stand idly by doing nothing while they
listened to their brethren fight and die around them. After all,
they loved battle. It was their life, and their death.

Alfgifu wanted to feel the same way they
did. Instead, she felt debilitated. She could hardly believe that
Ethelred had worked up the nerve to come here and fight Canute
after months of exile from his own kingdom. Had she been wrong to
come here? Had it all been for nothing? Would Canute’s forces be
demolished, even more quickly than they had been gathered? Would
she lose everything—her loyal hearth companions, her estates, her
wealth, her dignity—all for a young Viking who would not live up to
his father’s legacy?

“Well go on, let’s fight them!” she
cried.

Most of them fell for it: they drew their
blades and ran from the chamber. But one remained behind, sword
drawn, determined to ensure that she did not escape.

So the two of them remained in their dark
prison, and he alone witnessed the way she trembled and cowered,
unable to face the possibility of defeat. Better to stay here in
the haze and darkness, she thought, and let it blind her.

*

At nightfall, the noises of battle faded
down, to be replaced by the ongoing groans of the injured. At last,
hungry and in need of relief, Alfgifu and her escort left the
lodge.

In the twilight, they stumbled among the
dead and wounded. The blood shone black in the night. Things
squished under her feet that she was grateful she could not see.
Embers and dying fires glowed throughout the city brighter than the
moonlight. A second sky seemed to hover directly over the turf
roofs where all the smoke collected in a thick, smothering blanket.
Alfgifu coughed and rubbed her stinging eyes, feeling sticky trails
on her cheeks where her eyes had already shed rivers of water.

Someone reached out and grabbed her ankle,
begging for help. She nearly tripped. Resisting the urge to kick
him in the face, she kept going.

Despite all the sobbing, and moaning, and
the flames that refused to die, Alfgifu’s heart lifted. The number
of dead was tremendous, the Vikings’ stores destroyed, their new
horses scattered; but they still held the city. Whatever had
happened, Ethelred’s forces had pulled away eventually, and that
mattered the most.

Canute was in his lodge, but one would not
have guessed by the silence hovering over it. She recognized some
of his chiefs lurking outside, their faces either sullen or
furious, but all turned away from Canute’s door. It was strange to
her that not all of them were joined in a flurry of conversation
and activity.

The housecarls guarding his door did not let
her in at first, though she yelled and argued with them. She should
have expected as much; Canute would not talk to his own chiefs
right now. Why would he talk to her?

Then one of them stepped forward, and he
said, “If she wants to, why not let her?”

This surprised her. She realized that Canute
must not have forbidden anyone to enter; they were all simply
afraid to. She noticed a dead body very close to the door of the
lodge, and thought that it was a strange place for someone to have
died from the battle. He had recently been stabbed in the chest, it
appeared.

The housecarl followed her gaze. “That’s the
last man who tried to go in.”

“Oh.” She gulped. “Well he won’t hurt me.
I’m carrying his child.”

“You are?”

She had no idea, yet. But she thought it was
a safe assumption. Canute must have assumed the same, or he might
have let her escape the night before. She focused on the task at
hand. “Do you know what is he doing in there?” she asked.

The housecarl shook his head helplessly.
“He’s … talking.”

“Talking? To whom?”

He shrugged.

She took a deep breath, pushed back her
shoulders, and clenched her fists. “Well I’m going in.”

As her trembling fingers pushed open the
door, she reminded herself that she was not afraid of death. Only
failure. And it would be a failure if she did not see Canute now,
while all of his men were scared to, while he was vulnerable, and
while there was no one else on earth he seemed to trust.

She stepped inside, very quietly, and closed
the door behind her.

Canute was on the other side of the lodge,
pacing back and forth along the floorboards, which creaked as if
they might soon break apart and drop him into the sunken earth
below. He wore no shirt, and his pale skin was splotched with dried
blood and bruises. Surely enough, he was talking, though whether to
himself or the hanging crucifix on the wall to which he
occasionally cast his glance, she wasn’t sure at first.

“You’re not weak. You’re not idle,” he
snarled. “You’re stronger than all of them. You did this on
purpose. You let them believe victory was in their grasp. When they
see your true strength they will cower. God chose
you.
”

So, she realized, he was indeed talking to
himself … about himself.

“You’ll show them,” he went on. “You’re a
man. A real man. You’ll even have a son soon ...”

Feeling more and more uncomfortable, Alfgifu
at last announced herself by clearing her throat.

He turned to her with wild eyes. Then with
no hesitation, in one flowing motion, he drew a knife from his belt
and made to fling it.

“You won today,” she said quickly, as if her
heart wasn’t racing in her chest.

He paused.

“You held your ground. That’s what matters.
Now you must make it seem as if Ethelred made a mistake by
attacking you at all.”

He lowered the knife. His eyes cleared, as
if realizing for the first time who she was. “Alfgifu. Did God send
you?”

She wanted to gawk at him. He sounded crazy.
But she did not think it would be in her best interest to express
as much. Instead, she walked closer to him, feigning confidence.
“God does everything, doesn’t He?” She could see that this is what
he wanted to hear. “And He does it for you, because He wants you to
be King of Engla-lond. And Scandinavia.”

He dropped the knife, which thudded onto the
floor.

She glared up at him, feeling his own gaze
traverse her face, and remembering the way he had held her and
chopped off her hair. “You said my emotions made me weak,” she
hissed. “You were wrong about that, you know. You’re even more
governed by your emotions than I am. It’s not what makes us weak.
It’s what makes us strong.”

He flinched as she reached up and put her
fingers against his cheek. His eyes were wider than she had ever
seen them before, staring at her, desperate, searching. She had him
now.

“Make Ethelred regret attacking you,” she
whispered. “Show him that he has asked for his own demise. Make it
seem as if this attack is what spurred you to raid the countryside.
His people will hate him for it.”

“Hm,” said Canute. His gaze wandered off as
he considered this.