‘Yes,’ I answered. Finan leaned on the wooden parapet. I was searching the sky for an omen, any omen.

‘Rumwald reckons Æthelstan has twelve hundred men,’ Finan remarked.

‘Fourteen hundred if Merewalh has joined him.’

‘Should be enough,’ Finan said, ‘so long as the East Anglians don’t fight too hard.’

‘Maybe.’

‘Maybe,’ Finan repeated, and then, after a pause, ‘horsemen.’ He pointed and I saw two horsemen riding down the hill towards the far end of the bridge. They paused by the Red Pig and after a moment the men lounging on the benches stood, picked up their shields, crossed the street, and vanished into the western alleys. The horsemen came on down to the bridge, reining in at the barricade. ‘Those earslings at the barricade aren’t doing any good,’ Finan said. I supposed they were there to stop men crossing the river to escape the battle, but if any man did try to flee they would only reach Suðgeweork’s fort, which they must assume was still under Æthelhelm’s control. The small force at the barricade was pointless, and it seemed the horsemen had come to order them away. ‘Pity,’ Finan said.

‘Pity?’

‘I wanted to slaughter that bastard for calling me grandpa. Now he’s gone.’ The men had indeed been ordered away from the barricade. The horsemen accompanied them westwards and we watched till they disappeared up a side street. ‘Nothing to stop us now,’ Finan said, and I knew he sensed my reluctance. My ribs hurt, my shoulders hurt. I gazed at the smoke-smeared sky, but saw no omen, good or bad. ‘If we meet Waormund,’ Finan said quietly, ‘I’ll fight him.’ And I knew from those words that he did not just sense my reluctance, he sensed my fear.

‘We must go,’ I said harshly.

Most of Rumwald’s troops carried shields that bore Æthelstan’s badge of the dragon with its lightning bolt. It was horribly dangerous to show that shield inside the city, but I could not ask men to fight without shields. It was a risk we must take, though I also took care to make sure some men wore the red cloaks we had captured, and for others to carry the shields we had taken from Hyglac’s garrison, which showed a fish and a cross, evidently the badge of the Abbot of Basengas. I was fearful that when men in the city saw us crossing the bridge they would realise we were the enemy and would send a force to oppose us, but perhaps the red cloaks and the sight of Æthelhelm’s banner still flying above Suðgeweork’s fort would deceive them. I had known when I first decided to cross to the southern bank that returning over the river would be a dangerous moment, but I had wanted the men besieging the fort to join us. The easy capture of the fort had swollen our numbers, but we were still a pitifully small force. We needed to reach a gate, and if Æthelhelm’s men suspected that the three hundred soldiers crossing the bridge were a threat then we would end up being slaughtered in Lundene’s streets. I told the men to straggle, to take their time. Attackers would have hurried, but we walked slowly, and all the while I watched the street beyond the abandoned barricade and watched the men on the wharves. They saw us, but none showed alarm. Rumwald’s men had vanished from between the houses across the river, so did those red-cloaked troops think the Mercians had withdrawn? And that we were coming to reinforce Æthelhelm?