So I had slept, and now I was on the edge of Fæfresham, and Eadric was missing, and my closest friend was feeling doomed. ‘We’ll wait till dusk,’ I said. ‘If Eadric hasn’t returned, we’ll go back to Spearhafoc.’

‘God be praised,’ Finan said, and no sooner had he made the sign of the cross than Eadric appeared at the hedge.

He brought us a loaf of bread and a lump of cheese. ‘Cost me a shilling, lord.’

‘You went into the town?’

‘And it’s swarming with the buggers, lord. It’s not good news. Another sixty men came yesterday just before the storm struck. Came from Lundene, all of them in those silly red cloaks. They came on horseback.’ I swore and Finan made the sign of the cross. ‘The lady is still in the convent, lord,’ Eadric went on. ‘They’ve not tried to winkle her out, not yet. No news of the king’s death, you see? A shilling, lord.’

I gave him two. ‘How did you find all that out?’

‘Saw the priest! Father Rædwulf. Nice man. Gave me a blessing, he did.’

‘Who did you say you were?’

‘Told him the truth, of course! Told him we were trying to rescue the lady.’

‘And he said?’

‘He said he’d pray for us, lord.’

So my foolish dreams had ended. Here, in the damp grass behind a thorn hedge, reality had smacked me. The town was crammed with the enemy, we had come too late, and I had failed. ‘You were right,’ I told Finan ruefully.

‘I’m Irish, lord, of course I was right.’

‘We’ll go back to Spearhafoc,’ I said. ‘Burn Æthelhelm’s three ships in the harbour, then go back north.’

My father had once told me to make few oaths. ‘Oaths will bind you, boy,’ he had said, ‘and you’re a fool. You were born a fool. You jump before you think. So think before you swear an oath.’

I had been a fool again. Finan had been right, Sigtryggr had been right, Eadith had been right, and my father had been right. I had no business here. The fool’s errand was over.

Except it was not.

Because the horsemen came.

Four

There were thirty-six horsemen, all in mail, all with shields and half of them carrying long spears. They came from the east, circling below the small swell of pasture where we were crouched beside the blackthorn hedge. We had seen them, but they had not yet seen us.

My first instinct was to draw Serpent-Breath, and my first thought was that Æthelhelm’s men must have seen Eadric and followed him from the town. My second thought was the realisation that we had few shields. Men on foot who lack shields are easy meat for horsemen. My third thought was that these men were not wearing red cloaks and their shields did not show Æthelhelm’s badge of the leaping stag. The shields seemed to show some kind of animal, but the paint had faded and I did not recognise the symbol.