The Saxon Tales Collection, Books 5-7 by Bernard Cornwell

Author:Bernard Cornwell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins

Thirteen

Doubt weakens the will. Suppose I was wrong? Suppose Sigelf was simply a stubborn and stupid old man who really did think it was too dark to retreat? But though the doubts assailed me I kept on, leading my men east around the marshland that anchored the right of Sigelf’s line.

The wind was sharp, the night was freezing, the rain malevolent, and the darkness absolute, and if it had not been for the Centish campfires we would surely have been lost. A slew of fires marked Sigelf’s position, and there were still more just to the north, which told me that at least some Danes had now crossed the river and were sheltering from the weather in the hovels around the old Roman house. Those mysterious great fires, the big glow of burning halls, also showed much farther north, and those three I could not explain.

So much, and not just those distant fires, defied understanding. Some Danes had crossed the river, but the glow of fires on the northern bank told me that most still remained in Huntandon, which was strange if they intended to move southward. Sigelf’s men had not moved from where I had left them, which meant there was a gap between his men and the nearest Danes, and that gap was my opportunity.

I had left our horses behind, all of them tethered in woodland, and my men were on foot and carrying shields and weapons. The fires guided us, but for a long time we were so far from the nearest blaze that we could not see the ground and so we stumbled, fell, struggled, waded, and forced our way through the marsh. At least once I was up to my waist in water, the mud was clinging to my boots and the tussocks were tripping me, while startled birds screamed as they flew into the night, and that noise, I thought, must surely warn our enemies that we were on their flank, yet they seemed oblivious.

I sometimes lie awake in the long nights of old age and I think of the mad things I have done, the risks, the dice throws that challenged the gods. I remember assaulting the fort at Beamfleot, or facing Ubba, or creeping up the hill at Dunholm, yet almost none of those lunacies rivaled that cold, wet night in East Anglia. I led one hundred and thirty-four men through the winter darkness, and we were attacking between two enemy forces that together numbered at least four thousand. If we were caught, if we were challenged, if we were defeated then we would have nowhere to run and no place to hide except in our graves.

I had ordered all my Danes to be the vanguard. Men like Sihtric and Rollo, whose native tongue was Danish, men who had come to serve me after losing their lords, men who were sworn to me even though we fought against other Danes. I had seventeen such men, and to them I added my dozen Frisians.

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