“They didn’t put up much of a fight,” Sigtryggr grumbled.

The man I had blinded was moaning, crawling on his hands and knees, fumbling for his sword. Berg stepped to him, there was the sound of a blade in meat, and the man went still. “I need prisoners,” I said, and went into the church.

Saint Ælfthryth’s was a poor church, little more than a thatched barn with a rush-covered floor. The altar was a plain table on which hung a white cloth. Four candles, thick with wax, burned on the altar, which held a crucifix made of dull iron. The two sidewalls were decorated with leather hangings crudely painted with saints, beneath which rushlights burned in iron stands, while the edges of the small nave were heaped with sacks of charcoal, presumably because the church was the safest and driest place for the smiths to store their fuel. Loose charcoal crunched beneath my feet as I walked toward the simple altar where the priest, a thin pale man, stood facing us. “They have sanctuary!” he called.

“We claim sanctuary!” one of the men shouted desperately.

“What’s sanctuary?” Berg asked. He still held Bone-Ripper, her blood diluted by the rain.

Sigtryggr came up beside me, his men crowding in behind. “Why are we just watching them?” he asked. “Why not kill them?”

“They have sanctuary.”

Svart was holding a severed hand. I assumed he meant to boil the flesh off the bones and add them to his beard. “I’ll kill them,” he growled.

“I need prisoners,” I said, then looked at the two men. “Put your swords down,” I told them, and, when they hesitated, shouted the order. They dropped their swords.

The priest, a brave man considering he faced a group of armed men in his nighttime church, held up a hand. “They have sanctuary,” he said again.

“They have sanctuary, lord,” I corrected him, then walked to the altar and used the edge of the white cloth to clean the blood and rain from Serpent-Breath’s blade. “Sanctuary,” I explained for the benefit of any of Sigtryggr’s Norsemen unfamiliar with the idea, “is offered by the church to criminals. So long as they remain here we can’t touch them without being criminals ourselves.” I kicked the two men’s swords toward Berg. “If we assault them here we’ll be punished.”

“They won’t dare punish me,” Sigtryggr said.

“You haven’t experienced the fury of the priests,” I said. “They preach peace and demand the death of their enemies. Besides, I want to release them.”

“Release them?” Sigtryggr exclaimed.

“Someone has to give Lord Æthelhelm the good news,” I explained, then I pushed Serpent-Breath into her scabbard and turned back to the two men. Both were young. One had a bruise on his cheek and was shaking with fear, the other was surly and had the courage to face me boldly. I had been using Danish to talk to Sigtryggr, but now used the Saxon tongue. “Who are you?” I asked the surly man.