“Too heavy and too slow.”

“My father had a Frisian ship once,” he said, “and it was a beauty.”

“You should persuade your friend Æthelstan to give you ships,” I said, “then you can sail home.”

He smiled, despite my harsh tone. “I have ships, lord, but where is home? I thought Ireland was my home.”

“Then go back there.”

He gave me a long look, as if weighing the depth of my hostility. “You think I don’t want to go back?” he asked. “I would, lord, tomorrow, but Ireland is cursed. They’re not men, they’re fiends.”

“They killed your father?”

He nodded. “They broke his shield wall.”

“But you brought men away from the battle?”

“One hundred and sixty-three men and their families. Nine ships.” He sounded proud of that, and so he should have been. Retreating from a defeat is one of the hardest things to do in war, yet Ingilmundr, if he spoke truth, had fought his way back to the Irish shore. I could imagine the horror of that day; a broken shield wall, the shrieks of maddened warriors slaughtering their enemies, and the horsemen with their sharp spears racing in pursuit.

“You did well,” I said, and looked down at his two amulets. “Which god did you pray to?”

He laughed at that. “To Thor, of course.”

“Yet you wear a cross.”

He fingered the heavy silver ornament. “It was a gift from my friend Æthelstan. It would be churlish to hide it away.”

“Your friend Æthelstan,” I said, mocking the word “friend” with my tone, “would like you to be baptized.”

“He would, I know.”

“And you keep his hopes alive?”

“Do I?” he asked. He seemed amused by my questions. “Perhaps his god is more powerful than ours? Do you care which god I worship, Lord Uhtred?”

“I like to know my enemies,” I said.

He smiled at that. “I am not your enemy, Lord Uhtred.”

“Then what are you? A loyal oath-follower of Prince Æthelstan? A settler pretending to be interested in the Saxon god?”

“We are humble farmers now,” he said, “farmers and shepherds and fishermen.”

“And I’m a humble goatherd,” I said.

He laughed again. “A goatherd who wins his battles.”

“I do,” I said.

“Then let us make sure we are always on the same side,” he said quietly. He looked at the cross that crowned the prow of the nearest ship. “I was not the only man driven out of Ireland,” he said, and something in his tone made me pay attention. “Anluf is still there, but for how long?”

“Anluf?”

“He is the greatest chieftain of the Irish Norse and he has strong fortresses. Even fiends find those walls deadly. Anluf saw my father as a rival, and refused to help us, but that is not why we lost. My father lost the battle,” he gazed across the placid Mærse as he spoke, “because his brother and his men retreated before the fight. I suspect he was bribed with Irish gold.”