“Four,” Svart put in.

“That didn’t prove true,” I said, earning a scowl from Svart, “but the fear lingers. The Saxons think we’re pagan savages, and they’d rather talk us into submission than fight us. They will fight us if they have to, but Edward fears defeat, because if we break his armies then East Anglia revolts, the Mercians will demand their own king again, and the Wessex nobles will want a new king.”

Sigtryggr smiled wanly. “Maybe we should just invade Mercia? Beat the bastards.”

“We do that,” I said, knowing he was not serious, “and Constantin of Scotland will stab us in the back.”

Sigtryggr grunted. He was dressed for the Witan, wearing a robe of dark blue wool edged in cloth of gold. A simple crown, nothing more than a ring of gilt bronze, rested on a table beside his jug of ale. “This ale tastes like cow piss,” he grumbled. “You don’t think I should make peace with Edward?”

“It depends on the price.”

“I want Sköll dead,” he said vengefully. “Killing that bastard is worth any price.”

“Worth submission to Edward?”

Sigtryggr looked at me mournfully. “I have little choice.”

“Baptism?”

“I don’t mind getting wet.”

“Tribute?”

He grinned. “I’ll equip a pair of ships and we’ll go viking. We’ll raid a fat Wessex monastery and there’s the tribute.”

“And even if you do submit,” I ignored his idea, “and make a treaty, the Saxons will break it as soon as they think it’s safe to invade you.”

He nodded. “But I’ll still have time to kill Sköll first.”

“Unless I reach him before you.”

He half smiled at that. “What happens if I refuse to submit?”

“The Saxons will get braver and braver. They’ll provoke you with cattle raids, they’ll keep small armies on the border, they’ll tax your trade more heavily, their ships will capture your merchant ships, and in the end they’ll invade.”

“So either way we lose?”

“Not if we build up our strength.”

He offered a mirthless laugh to that. “And how do I do that?”

“We beat Sköll,” I said firmly, “and we bind Cumbraland to Northumbria. We force all those Norse bastards to swear loyalty to you. We make an army of úlfhéðnar. We unite the Northmen and put the fear of the gods into the Saxons.”

“I like that idea,” Sigtryggr said quietly. If I had known the truth of what I had just said I might have kept silent. Or perhaps not. Wyrd bið ful āræd. But at least Sigtryggr saw some hope in those words. He traced a finger around his crown, thinking. “And we can’t subdue Cumbraland unless we’re at peace with Edward.”

I nodded reluctantly. “Yes, lord King, we can’t fight both at once.”

He stood. “Then let’s go and grovel to the sick bastard.”

And so we climbed the hill. We would grovel.

We passed Saint Ælfthryth’s church where we had cornered the two fugitives. The night’s rain had washed the blood from the street, and the town reeve’s men had removed the bodies. A bell was tolling from the hilltop, presumably to summon the Witan, but the steep track leading up to the high church and the palace was being guarded by spearmen who barred us from climbing the hill while a procession of horsemen passed by. There were fifty or sixty riders, all in mail, all with helmets, all carrying spears, and all going toward the palace, and at their center was a small cart drawn by a pair of heavy horses. The cart, little more than a farm wagon, had been draped with dark blue cloth and furnished with cushions on which sat two women and a priest. One woman was old, the other young and long-faced with a close-fitting bonnet that hid most of her dark hair. She was richly dressed in somber gray and black, looked sad, and wore a large silver cross at her breast. The cart lurched alarmingly on the rough road, and the young woman clutched one of the side rails to steady herself. “Who’s that?” Sigtryggr asked me.