‘Safe enough,’ I said, trying to reassure her and hoping I told the truth. ‘The East Anglians will think we all escaped on Spearhafoc. They won’t be searching for us.’

‘And Spearhafoc,’ she stumbled over the unfamiliar name, ‘is where?’

‘Well on her way home by now, I hope.’

‘And will your people send help?’

‘They won’t even know whether we’re alive,’ I said, ‘so if they’ve any sense they’ll shut the fortress doors, guard the ramparts, and wait for news. That’s what I’d do.’

‘And what do we do?’

‘We capture Gunnald’s second ship,’ I said, ‘and follow Spearhafoc home.’

‘So we stay here till then?’

‘Better that than the cellar next to the cesspit.’

‘Lord!’ Beornoth called from the foot of the stairs. ‘You’ll want to see this!’

I went back down to the wharf and followed Beornoth to the end of the westernmost pier where Finan was waiting. The Irishman jerked his head downstream. ‘Enough of the bastards,’ he said.

Four ships were being rowed upriver. They looked to be Saxon ships, big and heavy, and all four had crosses on their prows. The tide was ebbing, which made the water seethe through the spaces between the bridge piers, but none of these ships was trying to go upstream because all four had masts crossed by spars on which sails were furled and none of their crews was trying to lower those masts. They began to turn towards the downstream wharves, their oarsmen struggling against tide and current, and as they turned I saw the ships’ big bellies were crammed with men and many of those men wore the dark red cloak that was Æthelhelm’s mark. ‘The reinforcements,’ I said bleakly.

‘Enough of the bastards,’ Finan said again.

My only consolation as I watched my enemy bringing more men to the city was that Spearhafoc was not being towed or rowed with them. Not that four such heavily-loaded ships would have had a chance of outrunning and capturing my ship, but it suggested Berg and his crew had slipped past them and were on their way north. That thought made me wonder about Bebbanburg and the rumours of plague. I touched my hammer amulet and said a prayer to the gods that my son was safe, that his prisoners were securely held, and that Eadgifu and her children would not sicken. I had saved her sons from Æthelhelm’s spite, but had I sent them instead to an agonising death from the plague?

‘What are you thinking?’ Finan had seen me touch the hammer.

‘That we hide here,’ I said, ‘we wait, and then we go home.’

Home, I thought wistfully. I should never have left it.

All we could do was wait. The ship commanded by Gunnald’s son could return at any moment which meant I had to have men watching on the wharf, and other men guarding the courtyard gate, and still others in the warehouse where we had chained the captured guards in one of the slave pens. The slaves themselves were neither chained nor penned, but forbidden to leave because I dared not risk one of them betraying our presence.