Ragna said: “Agnes, go into town and fetch Hildi, the midwife who attended me when I gave birth to the twins.” Hildi was the most sensible medical practitioner in Shiring.

Agnes hurried away.

“Bern, talk to the soldiers and find someone who knows what happened to the ealdorman.”

“Right away, my lady.”

Wynstan came in. He said nothing but stood staring at the supine form of Wilf.

Ragna concentrated on her husband. “Wilf, can you understand me?”

He opened his eyes and took a long moment to fix his gaze on her, but then she could tell that he knew her. “Yes,” he said.

“How were you wounded?”

He frowned. “Can’t remember.”

“Are you in pain?”

“Headache.” The words came slowly but they were clear.

“How bad?”

“Not bad.”

“Anything else?”

He sighed. “Very tired.”

Wynstan said: “It’s serious.” Then he left.

Bern returned with a soldier called Bada. “It wasn’t even a battle, more of a skirmish,” Bada said in a tone of apology, as if his commander should not have been hurt in something as inglorious as a minor brawl.

Ragna said: “Just tell me how it happened.”

“Ealdorman Wilwulf was riding Cloud, as usual, and I was right behind him.” He spoke succinctly, a soldier reporting to a superior, and Ragna was grateful for his clarity. “We came upon a group of Vikings all of a sudden, on the bank of the river Exe a few miles upstream of Exeter. They had just raided a village and were loading the loot onto their ship—chickens, ale, money, a calf—before returning to their camp. Wilf jumped off his horse and stuck his sword into one of the Vikings, killing him; but he slipped on the riverside mud and fell. Cloud stamped on Wilf’s head, and Wilf lay like one dead. I couldn’t check right then—I was under attack myself. But we killed most of the Vikings and the rest escaped in their ship. Then I went back to Wilf. He was breathing, and eventually he came around.”

“Thank you, Bada.”

Ragna saw Hildi in the background, listening, and beckoned her forward.

A woman of about fifty, she was small in stature and gray-haired. She knelt beside Wilf and studied him, taking her time. She touched the lump on his head with gentle fingertips. When she pressed, Wilf winced without opening his eyes, and she said: “Sorry.” She peered closely at the wound, parting his hair to see the skin. “Look,” she said to Ragna.

Ragna saw that Hildi had lifted a patch of loose skin to show a crack in the skull beneath. It looked as if a sliver of bone had come away.

“This explains all the blood on his clothes,” Hildi said. “But the bleeding stopped long ago.”

Wilf opened his eyes.

Hildi said: “Do you know how you were hurt?”

“No.”

She held up her right hand with three fingers sticking up. “How many fingers?”

“Three.”

She lifted her left hand with four fingers showing. “How many altogether?”