And they were doing it too. Edmund’s hand tensed on the bloody sword-hilt and he swayed as if to move forward. Instantly the brawny shadows on either side of him, the captains of his bodyguard, edged slightly forward, blocking him in with shield and body. They would not let him throw himself into the melee. As soon as the initial slaughter of sleeping men had stopped and the fight had begun, they had been in front of him.
“Easy, lord,” muttered Wigga. “See Totta and the boys there. They’ll get through these bastards yet.”
As he spoke the battle surged in front of them, first a few feet forward as a Viking went down and the English rushed at the momentary gap. Then back, back. Above the helmets and the raised shields a battle-axe whirled, the thuds as it struck lindenwood turning to a crash of steel on mail. The swaying mob ejected a body, cleft through its mail from neck to breastbone. For an instant Edmund saw a giant figure twirling its axe in one hand like a boy’s ox-goad, daring the English to come on. They did, fiercely, and all he could see was straining backs.
“We must have killed a thousand of the bastards already,” said Eddi on his other hand. In a moment, Edmund knew, one or the other of them would say “Time to get out of here, lord,” and he would be hustled away. If they could get away. Most of his army, the country thanes and their levies, were already making for the rear. They had done their job: burst over the stockade behind the king and his picked strikers, massacred the sleepers, overwhelmed the ship-guards and set fire to as many beached longships as they could. But they had never expected to stand in line and exchange blows with the professional champions of the North, nor did they mean to. Catch them asleep and unarmored, yes. Fight them awake and enraged, man to man, toe to toe—that was the duty of their betters.
One break, Edmund prayed. Almighty God eternal, one break in this square and we will be through and attacking them from all sides. The war will be over and the pagans destroyed. No more dead boys in meadows and children’s corpses tossed down wells. But if they stand another minute, long enough for a mower to whet his scythe… Then it is we who will break and, for me, it will be the fate of Wulfgar.
The thought of his tormented thane swelled his heart till it seemed the links of his mail must snap. The king shoved Wigga aside and strode forward, sword raised, looking for a gap in the fighters where he could thrust forward. He shouted full-throatedly, so that his voice echoed inside the metal of his ancient visor:
“Break through! Break through! The hoard of Raedwald, I swear it, to the man who breaks their ranks. And five hundreds to the man who brings me the head of Ivar!”
Twenty paces away, Shef gathered his little band of rescued prisoners in the night. Many of the tarred longships along the river were now blazing furiously, throwing lurid light on the battle. All around them, the Vikings’ bivouac tents were down, flattened by the English charge, their occupants dead or wounded. Only in one place, in front of them, eight or ten pavilions still stood: the homes of the Ragnarssons, their chieftains, their guards—and their women. Round these the battle raged.
Shef turned to Alfgar and to the heavily-muscled thane beside him, standing a pace in front of the little knot of half-armed, heavy-breathing peasants.
“We have to break into those tents there. That’s where the Ragnarssons are.” And Godive, he thought silently. But only Alfgar would care about that.
In the firelight the thane’s teeth showed, a mirthless smile.
“Look,” he pointed.
For an instant again, as the battle cleared, two warriors showed in black silhouette, each leap of flame seeming to catch them in another contorted pose. The swords whirled, each blow parried forte a forte, the strokes coming forehand, backhand, at all angles, each one meeting a precisely timed counter. The warriors twisted and stamped, raising their shields, leaping over low strokes, moving with each blow into position for the next, trying to gain leverage even from the strokes of their enemy for a tiny advantage on the next counter, a weakened wrist, a strain, a hesitation.