No, reflected Ivar. The trap had been set, he was sure of that. But it had not been sprung. Probably the fools got up too late. Or were stuck in a marsh somewhere.
He stepped forward, placed his helmet on a spear, waved it in a circle. Immediately, from their concealment half a mile on the downstream flank of the English army, there broke a wave of riders, legs flapping as they kicked their horses into speed, steel glinting in the morning sun on point and edge and mail. The English swordsmen still shredding to the rear pointed, yelled, ran faster. Fools, thought Ivar. They still outnumber Hamal up there six to one. If they stood fast, formed line, they could finish him off before we got up to join in. And if we broke ranks to hurry they could win this battle yet. But there was something about armed riders that made scattered men run without even looking over their shoulders.
In any case Hamal and the mounted patrol—three hundred men, every horse that Ivar’s army had been able to lay bridle on—had targets other than single fugitives. Now, after battle, was the time to destroy leaders, to ensure that kingdoms could never recover their strength again. Ivar noted with approval the swerve as fifty men on the fastest horses aimed to head off the gold-coroneted figure now being urged over the skyline by his horse-thanes. Others pounded down on the straggle of carts and standards making laboriously for the rear. The main body was galloping hard along the ridge-line, obviously intent on the camp and the camp-followers that must be there, out of sight but only a few hundred yards the other side of the ridge.
Time to join them. Time to get rich. Time for sport. Ivar felt the excitement rise in his throat. They had balked him with Ella. Not with Edmund. They would not with Burgred. He enjoyed killing kings. And afterward—afterward there would be some one of the whores, maybe some one of the ladies, but anyway some soft, pale creature that no one would miss. And in the tumult of a sacked camp, with rape and death on every side, no one would notice. It would not be the girl that Sigvarthsson had taken from him. But there would be some other. Meanwhile.
Ivar turned, stepped carefully round the mess of entrails slowly spilling from the butchered man at his feet, replaced his helmet, waved his shield forward. The watching army, loot already stacked, men back in their ranks, gave a short, hoarse cheer and walked forward with him, up the hill, over the men they had killed themselves and the men the machines had slaughtered. As they tramped forward they shook out from their wedges to form a solid line four hundred yards across. Behind them the ship-guards already detailed watched them go.
So, from its concealment in the woods a mile upstream, did the Wayman army—confused, frustrated, already bickering over the limp shape of its leader.
Chapter Seven
We cannot afford to wait any longer,” said Thorvin. “We must settle this matter for good. And now.”
“The army is divided,” objected Geirulf, the priest of Tyr. “If the men see you too ride away, they will lose heart even more.”
Thorvin brushed the objection aside with an impatient gesture. Round him ran the cords with their holy rowan berries; the spear of Othin stood in the ground beside him next to the burning fire of Loki. Just as the time before, only priests of the Way sat in the sacred circle, with no laymen present. They meant to speak of things no layman should hear.
“That is what we have told ourselves for too long,” replied Thorvin. “Always there is something more important to think of than this central one. We should have solved the riddle long ago, as soon as we began to think the boy Shef might indeed be what he said: the one who will come from the North. We asked the question, we asked his friend, we asked Sigvarth Jarl—who thought he was his father. When we could find no answer we passed to other things.
“But now we must be sure. When he would not wear the pendant, I said, ‘there is still time.’ When he left the army and rode to find his woman, we thought, ‘he is a boy.’ Now he pretends to lead the army and leaves it in disorder. Next time what will he do? We have to know. Is he a child of Othin? And if he is, what will he be to us? Othin Allfather, father of gods and men? Or Othin Bölverk, God of the Hanged, Betrayer of Warriors, who gathers the heroes to himself only for his own purposes?