Conqueror

IV
CONQUEROR AD 1064-1066
I

Orm Egilsson didn't even notice the bog until his horse went down under him. The animal screamed in agony as its legs snapped like twigs, and Orm was sent flying out of his saddle and came down face-first in the mud.

Winded, he pushed up to his knees, and scraped cold black dirt from his eyes and mouth. His mail coat was a mass of heavy iron on his shoulders. His horse lay prone, a steaming mass, and silent. Orm could see its head was bent back impossibly far; it was a mercy that the horse had died instantly.

But that left Orm stranded, on his knees in the middle of this muddy bog.

He glanced back the way he had come, to the north. He could see the Norman raiders, a thousand of them, galloping under the June sky across a burning landscape. This adventure into Brittany included a party of English, and Orm could see the bright red-and-gold Fighting Man standard of Earl Harold, where he rode alongside William of Normandy. Sensibly, the leaders were avoiding the copse where Orm had got himself tripped up.

Orm Egilsson was no Norman but a Dane. He was an adventurer, a mercenary. He had actually been riding ahead of the Norman raiding party. That way he had a chance to be the first upon the next hapless Breton farmer and his terrified family. It wasn't much of a way to wage war, in Orm's opinion, to ravage a countryside, torch the buildings, slaughter the men, and leave every woman over the age of nine raped to death. But it was the Norman way – and though he avoided the butchery and the rapes, the best way Orm could impress his employer, a Norman count, was to be out ahead of the pack, his blade flashing, his war cries louder than anybody else's.

And that was why, as he took a short-cut through a small, tangled copse, he had been the first to come upon this patch of clinging bog.

Well, he had to get out of the mud. But when he tried to push himself up his arms just sank in the mush up to his elbows, and as he thrashed around the links of his mail coat clogged up and grew heavier. Winded from the fall, he was starting to tire. And, he realised, each time he struggled to free himself, all he succeeded in doing was stirring up the mud and sinking a little deeper. He had to laugh. Was this how his life was to end, drowning in mud? He would be turned away from paradise with the heroes' mockery ringing in his ears.

And so much for impressing the Duke, he thought bitterly. But he had no choice but to ask for help.

'Hey!' He shouted as loudly as he could, and took off his conical helmet to wave it. 'A hand! Over here!'

The Normans surged on like a storm, but he thought he saw a couple of riders peel off.

He struggled further, sank deeper. He repeated his cries in the Frankish spoken by the Normans, in English, and in Danish.

'I can hear you. No need to yell.'

The new voice was English, and a woman's. Orm tried to turn. The mud was now almost up to his waist, its heavy grasp tightening around his legs.

The woman, who must have been riding with the warriors, was standing at the far side of the copse, with a man beside her. Short, confident, wiry-looking, she wore no mail but a sensible tunic and trousers of tough-looking leather. Her brown hair was pulled back revealing a face bronzed by sun and rain. Blue-eyed, around twenty, she might have been pretty, Orm thought bleakly, if she wasn't so obviously amused by him.

The man beside her had similar pale blue eyes; he was in mail and carried a mace, but looked too slight to be a warrior. Older than the woman he looked sly to Orm – slim and lithe, like a snake.

Orm knew him. 'You're the priest who rides with Harold.'

'That's true,' the man said. 'My name is Sihtric. This is my sister, Godgifu.'

Orm tried to straighten up, recovering as much dignity as he could. 'And I am Orm, son of Egil, son of Egil, who-' But he tipped over backward, and, thrashing in the mud, sank a bit deeper.

Like the call of a bird Godgifu's laughter echoed around the little copse.

Sihtric murmured, 'It isn't polite to mock the poor chap, Godgifu. So you're Egilsson? In fact I've been meaning to find you. Is it true your father was born in Vinland?'

'Conceived there,' Orm said, gasping in the mud. 'Born in Greenland.'

'Ah. And do you have an ancestor, another Egil, who fought Alfred at Ethandune?'

'Yes.'

'Then our families have a connection,' said Sihtric. 'You see-'

'I would happily debate genealogies with you all day, priest,' Orm said, breathless, 'but I have rather more pressing issues on my mind.'

'He's right,' said Godgifu practically. 'Come, brother, we can discuss the Menologium later; for now let's help him out.'

Godgifu and Sihtric cautiously worked their way around the bog. They found a fallen branch and laid it across the mud. The branch was heavy, its bark rotten and crusted with lichen, and they were both soon filthy. Orm managed to grab the branch, which at least stopped him sinking further into the mud. But he couldn't pull himself out. They all kept trying, and Sihtric murmured a prayer in Latin.

'It's not prayers he needs right now but muscle, good Sihtric.' A tall, well-built man clad in expensive-looking mail came striding into the copse. Behind a glistening helmet inlaid with bronze, Orm glimpsed locks of greying red hair and a long moustache. He spoke English, and must have been about forty, but he was a slab of muscle who might have massed twice as much as the skinny priest.

Sihtric bowed. 'Lord. We've done our best, but-'

'I can see you have.'

'His name is Orm Egilsson,' Godgifu said.

'Orm, is it? One of William's paid warriors? I've seen men die like this before, once the mud gets in your mail, and your leather gets soaked – but not today. Eh, Orm Egilsson?'

He turned to his horse, which was being held by a boy, and took his shield. It was the Norman kind, the leaf shape with rounded top and pointed base that the craftsmen called half-lanceolate. The Englishman dropped the shield on the mud, and without hesitation strode out along it, showing impressive balance. Positioning his feet carefully, he leaned over and stripped off his glove. 'Flesh on flesh is your best bet now.'

Orm threw his glove towards Godgifu and reached up. The Englishman warmly clasped Orm's hand and pulled. Orm scrambled, kicking at the mud, but it was the Englishman whose sheer straining power won the day, and Orm came free all at once like a baby popping from between its mother's legs.

The Englishman helped the Dane to stand and clapped him on the shoulder. 'There. Next time watch where you're riding.' Before Orm could thank him he picked up his shield and strode back to his horse.

The priest said, 'What a man. Sees a problem, solves it, moves on. Well, Orm Egilsson, you'll have a story to tell when you get drunk tonight.'

Godgifu scraped the mud that clung to Orm's mail. 'Anything broken?'

'Only my pride.' He looked down at her as her gloved hands brushed across his chest. Their eyes met, her bright boyish gaze playful yet with hints of depth. The way she stroked his chest felt almost tender, despite the layers of cloth and metal that separated his flesh from hers.

He asked, 'Who was that?' But he thought he knew the answer before the priest replied.

Sihtric said, 'Harold, son of Godwine, Earl of Wessex. Quite a man, don't you think? And now you owe him your life, Orm Egilsson.'

It was midsummer, 1064.