‘But I can’t,’ Finan said firmly, ‘I want something decent. There must be fish for sale?’

‘Horse meat tastes good,’ I insisted. ‘Especially an older horse. My father always swore that an older horse’s liver was a meal fit for the gods. He once made me kill a foal just so he could taste the liver, and he hated it, and after that he always insisted on an older horse. But you mustn’t overcook it, it’s best while it’s still a bit bloody.’

‘Oh, dear God,’ Finan said, ‘and I thought your father was a Christian.’

‘He was, so every time he ate horse liver he added it to the other sins he confessed, and there were enough of those.’

‘And you’ll find your Benedetta won’t eat horse meat,’ Finan said slyly, ‘she’s a good Christian.’

‘My Benedetta?’ I asked.

He just chuckled and I thought of Eadith in far-off Bebbanburg. Was there really plague in the north? And if there was, had it reached my fortress? Jorund had heard a rumour that it was ravaging Eoferwic where two of my grandchildren lived with their father, and I touched my hammer amulet and sent a wordless prayer to the gods. Finan saw the gesture. ‘Worried?’ he asked.

‘I should never have left Bebbanburg,’ I said.

I knew Finan agreed with me, but he had the decency to say nothing of that. He just stared at the glitter of sunlight on the river, then stiffened and put a hand on my arm. ‘What’s happening?’

I came out of my reverie and saw Immar was standing and staring downriver. Then Immar turned and, looking at me, pointed eastwards, and I saw a mast, crossed with a yard on which a sail was furled, showing above the eastern palisade. ‘Come back!’ I shouted at Immar. ‘And bring the boys! Alaina! Come!’

We had planned to present Gunnald’s son with a small mystery when he arrived. Usually, the captive guards had told us, there would be at least one man on the wharf to take the arriving ship’s lines. ‘Lyfing Gunnaldson needs help, lord,’ Deogol the one-handed captive had told me. ‘He can’t handle a ship like his father. And if there’s no one on the wharf he sounds a horn and we’ll run to help him.’

‘And if no one helps him?’ I had asked.

Deogol had shrugged. ‘He’ll get ashore somehow, lord.’

I was insisting that the arriving ship must find the wharf deserted and that no one should help Lyfing Gunnaldson tie up. If he saw strangers on the wharf he would be suspicious, and he would likely draw off until he saw a familiar face, and I dared not risk it. Better to let him think the guards were lazy and let him moor the ship himself.

I was not even sure that the approaching ship was the one we wanted, but she did have a mast, and no ship with a mast could get under the bridge, so any that did come this far upriver were trying to reach one of the very few wharves that lay this close to where the Temes foamed and fell between the bridge piers.